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THE 



SEAT OF EMPIRE 



CHARLES CARLETON COFFIN, 

" CARLETON." 



" I now believe that the ultimate last seat of government on this great continent 
will be found somewhere within a circle or radius not very far from the spot on 
which I stand, at the head of navigation on the Mississippi River." 

W. H. Sewakd, Speech at St. Paul, 1860. 




1.A.0GDEN. 



BOSTON: 
FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO. 
1870. 



^ 



riot 

,C(o5 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by 

CHARLES CAELETON COFFIN, 

in the Clerk's Oflace of the District Court for the District of Massachusetts. 



8y transfer 
l>. C. PttWic LIfcrwy 
J'JN 2 8 1940 



University Press: Welch, Bigelow, & Co., 
Cambridge. 



■WITHDRAWN 



TO 

JOHN GEEGORY SMITH, 

GOVERNOR OF VERMONT DURING THE REBELLION, 

WHOM I FIRST SAW TENDERLY CARING FOR THE SICK AND 

WOUNDED IN THE HOSPITALS OF FREDERICKSBURG, AND 

THROUGH WHOSE ENERGY AND PERSEVERANCE 

ONE OF THE GREATEST ENTERPRISES OF 

THE PRESENT CENTURY HAS BEEN 

SUCCESSFULLY INAUGURATED, 

^fjis Volume 

IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED. 



PUB! ir liBRAF.''. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I. 

FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 

Page 
Cutting loose from Care. — Map of the Northwest. — Leaving 
Chicago. — Fourth of July. — At La Crosse. — Dance on a 
Steamboat. — Up the Mississippi. — The Boundaries of Min- 
nesota. — Winona. — St. Paul. — Minneapolis. — The Father 
of Waters in Harness 

CHAPTER II. 

ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 

St. Cloud. — Our Party. — First Night in Camp. — A Midnight 
Thunder-Storm. — Sunday in Camp. — Up the Sauk Valley. — 
White Bear Lake. — Catching a Turtle. — Lightning Lake. — 
Second Sabbath in Camp. — The River Systems of the North- 
west. — Elevations across the Continent. — The Future . . 25 



CHAPTER III. 

THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 

Down the Valley of the Red River. — Breckeuridge. — Fort Ab- 
ercrombie. — Climate. — Winters at Winnipeg. — Burlingtoa 

— The Emigrant. — Father Genin. — Mackenzie. — Harman. — 
Sir John Richardson. — Captain Palliser. — Father De Smeti^ 

— Winters on the Saskatohawan. — Snow-Fall . . .51 

1. A.U^-.L. . 



VI CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER lY. 

THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 

Winnipeggers. — Ride over the Prairie. — Dakota City. — 
Georgetown. — Hudson Bay Company Teams. — Parting Avltii 
our Friends. — The 43d Parallel. — Dakota. — Wyoming. — / 
Montana. — Idaho. — Oregon. — Washington. — British Co- 
lumbia. — Distances. — Fisheries of the Pacific. — IMr. Sew- 
ard's Speech . . . o 77 

CHAPTER Y. 

THE FRONTIER. 

Bottineau. — The Leaf Hills. — A Ride over the Plain. — The 
Park Region. — Settlers. — How they kept the Fourth of July. 
— Chippewa Indians. — Rush Lake. — A Serenade on the 
Prairie. — German Pioneers. — Otter-Tail Lake . . .109 

CHAPTER YI. 

ROUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 

Noon Lunch. — Toasting Pork. — A Montana Dutchman. — 
Emigrant Trains. — Camping at Night. — Wheat of Min- 
nesota. — The State in 1849. — A Word to Young Men. — 
Boys once more. — Our Last Camp-Fire .... 123 

CHAPTER YII. 

IN THE FOREST. 

Down-Easters. — The Eden of Lumbermen. — Country East of 
the Mississippi. — The Climate of the Forest Region. — White 
Bear Lake. — Travellers from Duluth. -^ A Maine Farmer in 
Minnesota. — Chengwatona. — Pitching of the Jlud-Wagon. 
Grindstone. — Kettle River. — Superior 137 



CONTENTS. vii 

CHAPTER VIII. 

DULUTH. 

Duluth. — Minnesota Point. — The Projected Breakwater. — 
Comparison with the Suez Canal. — The Town. — Period of 
Navigation. — The Lalve Superior and Mississippi Railroad. 
Transportation. — Elevators. — St. Louis River. — Minnesota 
Slate Quarry. — An Indian Chief and his Followers. — Rail- 
road Lands. — Manufacturing Industry. — Terms of the Rail- 
road Company 154 

CHAPTER IX. 

THE MINING REGION. 

The Apostle Islands. — Bayfield. — The Harbor.— Breakfast 
with Captain Vaughn. — Ashland. — Big Trout. — Onto- 
nagon. — Approach to^ Marquette. — The Harbor. — The 
Town. — Discovery of Iron Ore. — Mining Companies. — Va- 
rieties of Ore. — The Miners. — The Coming Years . . 169 

CHAPTER X. 

A FAMILIAR TALK. 

A Talk about the Northwest. — Mr. Blotter. — He wants a Farm. 

— Government Lands. — Homestead Law of Minnesota. — 
Exemption Laws. — The St. Paul and Pacific Railroad. — 
Liberal Terms of Payment. — Stock-Raising. — Robbing 
Mother Earth. — Native Grasses. — Fruit. — Small Grains. — 
Productions of the State, 1869. — Schools. — When to Emi- 
grate. — Prospective Development. — The Tide of Emigra- 
tion 186 

CHAPTER XI. 

NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 

How Communities grow. — Humboldt. — What I saw in 1846. 

— The Pacific. Coast. — River-Svstems. — Lewis and Clark. 



viu CONTENTS. 

— Jeff Davis. — Charter of the Company. — The Projectors. 

— The Line. — From Lake Superior to the Mississippi. — 
To the Rocky Mountains. — Deer Lodge Pass. — The West- 
ern Slope. — Mr. Roberts's Report. — Snow Blockades.— Ele- 
vations. — PoAver of Locomotives. — Bureau of Emigration. 

— Portable Houses. — Help to Emigi-ants, — The Future . 207 



THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 



CHAPTEE I. 

FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 

LAST summer I cut loose from all care, and 
enjoyed a few weeks of freedom and recrea- 
tion with a party of gentlemen on the frontier 
between Lake Superior and the Missouri Eiver. 
I was charmed by the beauty of the country, 
amazed at its resources, and favorably impressed 
by its probable future. Its attractions were set 
forth in a series of letters contributed to the Bos- 
ton Journal. 

People from every Eastern State, as well as from 
New York and the British Provinces, have called 
upon me since my return, for the purpose of " hav- 
ing a talk about the Northwest," while others have 
applied by letter for additional or specific infor- 
mation, and others still have requested a repub- 
lication of the letters. In response to these calls 
this small volume has been prepared, setting forth 
the physical features of the vast reach of country 
lying between the Lakes and the Pacific, not only 

1 A 



2 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

in the United States, but in British America as 
well. 

The most trustworthy accounts of persons who 
have lived there, as well as of engineers who have 
been sent out by the United States, British, and 
Canadian governments, have been collated, that 
those seeking a home in Minnesota or Dakota 
may know what sort of a country lies beyond, 
and what will be its probable future. 

The map accompanying the volume has been 
prepared for the most part by the Bureau of the 
United States Topographical Engineers. It gi^'es 
me pleasure to acknowledge my indebtedness to 
Major- General Humphreys, in charge of the Bu- 
reau, and to Colonel Woodruffe, in charge of the 
map department, for permission to use the same. 

Through their courtesy I am enabled to place 
before the public the most complete map ever 
published of the country between the 36th and 
55th parallel, extending across the continent, and 
showing not only the entire railway system of the 
Eastern and Middle States, but also the Union 
Pacific Piailroad and the JSTorthern Pacific, now 
under construction. The figures followed by the 
letter T have reference to the elevation of the 
locality above tide-water, thus enabling the reader 
to obtain at a glance a comprehensive idea of the 
topographical as well as the geographical features 
of the country. 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 3 

" All aboard for the Northwest ! " 

So shouted the stalwart porter of the Sherman 
House, Chicago, on the mornmg of the 5th of 
July, 1869. 

Giving heed to the call, we descended the steps 
of the hotel and entered an omnibus waiting at 
the door, that quickly whirled us to the depot of 
the Chicao'O and Northwestern Eailroad. 

o 

There were about a dozen gentlemen in the 
party, all bound for the Northwest, to explore a 
portion of the vast reach of country lying between 
Lake Superior and the great northern bend of the 
Missouri Eiver. 

It Avas a pleasant, sunny, joyful morning. The 
anniversary of the nation's independence having 
fallen on the Sabbath, the celebration was observed 
on Monday, and the streets resounded with the 
explosion of fire-crackers. Americans, Germans, 
Norwegians, Irish, people of all nationalities, were 
celebrating the birthday of their adopted country. 
Not only in Chicago, but throughout the cosmo- 
politan State of Wisconsin, as we sped over its 
fertile prahies and through its towns and villages 
during the day, there was a repetition of the 
scene. 

Settlers from New England and the Middle 
States were having Sabbath-School, temperance, or 
civic celebrations ; Irish societies were marching in 
procession, bearing green banners emblazoned with 



4 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the shamrock, thistle, and harp of Erin; Ger- 
mans were drinking lager beer, singing songs, and 
smoking their meerschanms. All work was laid 
aside, and all hands — farmers with their wives 
and daughters, young men with their sweethearts, 
children in crowds — were observing in their va- 
rious w^ays the return of the holiday. 

Our route was by way of La Crosse, which we 
reached late in the evening. We were to go up 
the Mississippi on a steamer that lay moored to the 
bank. Its cabin was aglow with lights. Enter- 
ing it, we found a party of ladies and gentlemen 
formed for a quadrille. They were the officers of 
the boat and their friends from the town. A negro 
w^ith a bass-viol, and two Germans with violins, 
Vv^ere tuning their instruments and rosining their 
bows. 

We were met upon the threshold by a rosy- 
cheeked damsel, who gleefully exclaimed, — 

" 0, yeau have arrived at the right moment ! We 
are having a right good time, and we only want one 
more gentleman to make it go real good. Yeau '11 
dance neaw, won't ye ? I want a partner. 0, ye 
will neaw. I know ye will, and ye 11 call off the 
changes tew, won't ye ? N'eaw dew." 

N'ot having a "light fantastic toe" on either 
foot, we were forced to say no to this lively 
La Crosse maiden ; besides, we were tired and cov- 
ered with dust, and in sad plight for the ball-room. 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 5 

A member of Congress was next appealed to, then 
a grave and dignified Doctor of Divinity. 

A more ungallant party than ours never stood 
on a Western steamboat. Governor, judge, parson, 
members of Congress, all shook their heads and 
resisted the enthusiastic lady. In vain she urged 
them, and the poor girl, with downcast counte- 
nance, turned from the obdurate Yankees, and 
sailed in gloriously with a youth who fortunately 
entered the cabin at the moment. 

It was a rare sight to see, for they danced with 
a will. They made the steamer shake from stem 
to stern. The glass lamps tinkled in their brass 
settings, and the doors of staterooms rattled on 
their hinges, especially when the largest gentle- 
man of the party came to a shuffle. 

He is the Daniel Lambert of the Mississippi, — 
immense and gigantic, and having great develop- 
ment round the equator. 

Quadrille, cotillon, and waltz, and genuine west- 
ern break-downs followed one after the other. 
There was plenty to eat and drink in the pantry. 
The first thing we heard in the evening was the 
tuning of the instruments ; the last thing, as we 
dropped off to sleep, was the scraping of the vio- 
lins and the shuftling of feet. 

We are awake in the morning in season to take 
a look at the place before the boat casts off from 
its mooring for a trip to Winona. 



6 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

A company of Norwegian emigrants that came 
with lis on the train from Chicago are cooking 
their breakfast in and around the station. They 
sailed from Christiania for Quebec, and have been 
six weeks on the way. All ages are represented. 
It is a party made up of families. There are 
many light-haired maidens among them with deep 
blue eyes and blonde complexions ; and robust 
young men with honest faces, who have bidden 
farewell forever to their old homes upon the fiords 
of Norway, and who henceforth are to be citizens 
of the United States. 

They will find immediate employment on the 
railroads of Minnesota, in the construction of new 
lines. They are not hired by the day, but small 
sections are let out to individuals, who receive 
a specified sum for every sc[uare yard of earth 
thrown up. 

There is no discussion of the eight-hour ques- 
tion among them. They work sixteen hours of 
their own accord, instead of haggling over eight. 
They have no time to engage in rows, nor do they 
find occasion. They have had a bare existence 
in their old home ; life there was ever a strug- 
gle, the mere keeping together of soul and body, 
but here Hope leads them on. They are poor 
now, but a few years hence they will be well off 
in the world. They will have farms, nice houses, 
money in banks, government bonds, and railway 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 7 

stocks. They will obtain land at government price, 
will raise wheat, wool, or stock, and will soon find 
their land quadrupled in value. They will make 
excellent citizens. Their hearts are on the right 
side, — not physiologically, but morally, politi- 
cally, and religiously speaking. They are ardent 
lovers of liberty ; they cannot be trammelled by 
any shackles, political or ecclesiastical. They are 
frugal, industrious, and honest. Already there 
are several daily papers published in the Scandi- 
navian language. 

The steamer is ploughing the Mississippi 
acjainst the current northward. Wisconsin is on 
our right, Minnesota on our left ; and while we are 
moving on toward the region of country which we 
are to visit, we may while away the time by 
thinking over the general characteristics of the 
State of Minnesota, in which our explorations are 
to commence. 

The southern boundary strikes the river twenty- 
two miles below La Crosse. If I were to go down 
there and turn my steps due west, I might walk 
two hundred and sixty-four miles along the Iowa 
line before reaching the southwestern corner of 
the State. The western side is the longest, and 
if I were to start from the southw^estern corner 
and travel due north, I should have a journey 
of three hundred and sixty miles to accom- 
plish before reaching the northern boundary, — 



8 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the line between the United States and British 
America. 

Starting from Pembina, afc the northwest corner 
of the State, on the Eed Eiver of the North, and 
travelling due east eighty miles, I should reach 
the Lake of the Woods ; sailing across it sixty 
miles, then entering the river leading to Eainy 
Lake, I might pass through the wonderful water- 
way of lakes and rivers reaching to Lake Supe- 
rior, — a distance of about four hundred miles. 

The eastern boundary formed by the Mississippi, 
St. Croix, and Lake Superior is more irregular. 
Its general outline, as we look at it upon the map, 
is that of a crescent, cutting into Minnesota, the 
horns turned eastward. The area within the boun- 
daries thus described is estimated at 84,000 square 
miles, or 54,760,000 acres. It is a territory larger 
than Maine, ^ew Hampshire, Vermont, Massachu- 
setts, Ehode Island, and Connecticut combined. 

Here, upon the Mississippi, I gaze upon bluffs 
of gray limestone wrought into fantastic shape by 
the winds and storms of centuries and by the 
slow wearing of the river ; but were I to chmb 
them, and gain the general level of the country, I 
should behold rolling prairies dotted with lakes 
and ponds of pure water, and groves of oak and 
hickory. All of Minnesota east of the Mississippi 
is a timbered region. Here and there are open- 
ings; but, speaking in general terms, the entire 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 9 

country east of the river is a forest, whicii through 
the coming years Avill resound with the axe of 
the hmiberman. 

AVlien we go up the Mississippi eighty miles 
above St. Paul to St. Cloud, we shall find the Sauk 
Eiver coming in from the west ; and there the Mis- 
sissippi is no longer the boundary of the timbered 
lands, but the forest reaches across the stream 
westward to Otter-Tail Eiver, a distance of more 
than one hundred miles. The Sauk Eiver is its 
southern boundary. 

All the region north of the Sauk, at the head- 
waters of the Mississippi and north of Lake Supe- 
rior, is well supplied with timber. A belt of woods 
forty miles wide, starting from the Crow- Wing 
Eiver, extends south nearly to the Iowa boundary. 
It is broken here and there by prairie openings 
and fertile meadows. The tract is known through- 
out the IsTorthwest as the region of the " Big 
Woods." 

There are fringes of timber along the streams, 
so that the settler, wherever he may wish to make 
a home, will generally find material for building 
purposes within easy reach. In this respect Min- 
nesota is one of the most favored States of the 
Union. 

The formations of the bluffs now and then re- 
mind us of old castles upon the Ehine. They 
are, upon an average, three hundred and fifty feet 
1* 



10 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

above the summer level of the river. We are far 
from the Gulf of Mexico, yet the river at St. Paul 
is only six hundred and seventy-six feet above tide- 
water. 

Northward of Minneapolis tlie bluffs disappear, 
and the surface of the river is but a few feet below 
the general level of the country, which is about 
qne thousand feet above the sea. 

It is one of the remarkable topographical fea- 
tures of the continent, that from St. Paul to the 
Peace Eiver, which empties into the Athabasca, 
the elevation is about the same, though the dis- 
tance is more than one thousand miles. Through- 
out this great extent of territory, especially in Min- 
nesota, are innumerable lakes and ponds of pure 
fresh water, some of them having no visible outlet 
or inlet, with pebbly shores and beaches of white 
sand, bordered by groves and parks of oak, ash, 
and maple, lending an indescribable charm to the 
beauty of the landscape. 

"While we are making these observations the 
steamer is nearing Winona, a pleasant town, de- 
lightfully situated on a low prairie, elevated but a 
few feet above the river. The bluffs at this point 
recede, giving ample room for a town site with a 
ravine behind it. 

Nature has done a great deal for the place, — 
scooping out the ravine as if the sole purpose had 
been to make the construction of a railroad an 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 11 

easy matter. The Winona and St. Peter's Railway 
strikes out from the town over the prairie, winds 
through the ravine, and by easy grades gains the 
rolling country beyond. The road is nearly com- 
pleted to the Minnesota Eiver, one hundred and 
forty miles. It will eventually be extended to the 
western boundary of the State, and onward into 
Dakota. It is now owned by the Chicago and 
Northwestern Eailway Company, and runs through 
the centre of the second tier of counties in the 
State. The Southern Minnesota Railroad starts 
from La Crosse, and runs west through the first 
tier of counties. It is already constructed half- 
way across the State, and will be pushed on, as 
civilization advances, to the Missouri. That is the 
objective point of all the lines of railway leading 
west from the Mississippi, and they will soon be 
there. 

This city of Winona fifteen years ago had about 
one hundred inliabitants. It was a place where 
steamers stopped to take wood and discharge a 
few packages of freight, but to-day it has a popu- 
lation of nine thousand. Looking out upon it from 
the promenade deck of the steamer, we see new 
buildings going up, and can hear the hammers and 
saws of tlie carpenters. It already contains thir- 
teen churches and a Normal School with three 
hundred scholars, who are preparing to teach the 
children of the State, though the probabilities are 



12 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

that most of them will soon teach their own off- 
spring instead of their neighbors' ; for in the West 
young men are plenty, maidens scarce. Out 
here — 

' ' There is no goose so gray but soon or late 
Will find some honest gander for her mate." 

iN'ot SO in the East, for the young men there are 
pushing west, and women are in the majority. It 
is a certainty that some of them will know more 
of single blessedness than of married life. If they 
would only come out here, the certainty would be 
the other way. 

Not stopping at Winona, but hastening on board 
the train, we fly over the prairie, up the ravine, 
and out through one of the most fertile sections 
of the great grain-field of the Northwest. 

The superintendent of the road, Mr. Stewart, 
accompanies our party, and we receive pleasure 
and profit by having a gentleman with us who is 
so thoroughly informed as he to point out the ob- 
jects of interest along the way. By a winding road, 
now running under a high bluff where the lime- 
stone ledges overhang the track, now gliding over 
a high trestle-bridge from the northern to the 
southern side of the deep ravine, we gain at length 
the general table-land, and behold, reaching as far 
as the eye can see, fields of wheat. Fences are 
visible here and there, showing the division of 
farms ; but there is scarcely a break in the sea of 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 13 

grain, in flower now, rippling and waving in tlie 
passing breeze. Farm-houses dot the landscape, 
and white cottages are embowered in surrounding 
groves, and here and there we detect a small 
patch of corn or an acre of potatoes, — small isl- 
ands these in the OTeat ocean of wheat reachino- 
westward, northward, and southward. 

We are astonished when tlie train nears St. 
Charles, a toAvn of two thousand inhabitants, look- 
ing marvellously like a ^ew England village, to 
see a school-house just completed at a cost of 
$ 15,000 ! and still wider open we our eyes at 
Kochester, with a population of six thousand, where 
we behold a school-building that has cost $60,000! 
Upon inquiry we ascertain that the bulk of the 
population of these towns is from New England. 

A ride of about ninety miles brings us to Owa- 
tona, a town of about three thousand inhabitants. 

We are in Steele County. The little ri\ailets 
here meandering through the prairie and flowing 
southward reach the Mississippi only after crossing 
the State of Iowa, while those running northward 
join the Mississij)pi through the Minnesota Eiver. 

Here, as at Eochester, we behold charming land- 
scapes, immense fields of grain, groves of trees, 
snug cottages and farm-houses, and a thrifty town. 
Owatona has a school-house that cost the citizens 
$ 20,000 ; yet nine years ago the population of 
the entire county was only 2,862 ! The census of 



14 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

1870 will probably make it 15,000. So civiliza- 
tion advances, not only here, but all through the 
Northwest, especially where there are railroad fa- 
cilities. 

From Owatona we turn north and pass through 
Eice County, containing eighteen townships. It is 
one of the best-timbered counties west of the IMis- 
sissippi .; there are large tracts of oak, maple, but- 
ternut, walnut, poplar, elm, and boxwood. We 
glide through belts of timber where choppers are 
felling the trees for railroad ties, past fields where 
the industrious husbandman has turned the natu- 
ral grasses of the prairie into blooming clover. 

At Faribault a company of Norwegians, recently 
arrived from their homes beyond the sea, and not 
having reached their journey's end, are cooking 
their supper near the station. To-morrow they 
will be pushing on westward to the grounds al- 
ready purchased by the agent who has brought 
them out. 

In 1850 this entire county had only one hundred 
inhabitants ; the census of next year will probably 
show a population of twenty-five thousand, — one 
half Americans, one sixth Germans, one ninth 
Irish, besides Norwegians, Swedes, and Canadians. 
Faribault has about four thousand inhabitants, 
who have laid excellent foundations for future 
growth. They have an Episcopal College, a High 
School for ladies, a Theological Seminary, a Deaf 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 15 

and Dumb Asylum, two Congregational churches, 
also one Baptist, one Methodist, and one E]3isco- 
pal. They have excellent water-power on the 
Cannon Eiver. Five flouring-mills have already 
been erected. 

Fourteen miles beyond this place we find North- 
field with three thousand inhabitants, three fourths 
of them New-Englanders. Five churches and a 
college, two flouring-mills capable of turning out 
one hundred thousand barrels per annum, excellent 
schools, a go-ahead population, are the characteris- 
tics of this thoroughly wide-awake town. 

A mile or two beyond Northfield we enter Da- 
kota County, — one of the most fertile in the 
State. It was one of the first settled, and in 1860 
contained 9,058 inhabitants. Its present popula- 
tion is estimated at 20,000, — one third of them 
Irish, one third Americans, one quarter Germans, 
and the remainder of all nationalities. The lar- 
gest town is Hastings, on the Mississippi, contain- 
ing about four thousand inhabitants. The Has- 
tings and Dakota Eailroad, extending west, crosses 
the Milwaukie and St. Paul at Farmin^^ton, a 
pleasant little town located on a green and fertile 
prairie. Thirty miles of this Hastings and Dakota 
road are in operation, and it is pushing on west- 
ward, like all the others, to reach the territory of 
Dakota and the Missouri Eiver. 

On over the prairies we fly, reaching the oldest 



16 • THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

town in the State, Mendota, which was a trading- 
post of the American Fur Company as long ago as 
1828. It was livelier then than now, for in those 
years Indians by the thousand made it their ren- 
dezvous, coming^ in their bark canoes down the 
Minnesota from the borders of Dakota, down the 
St. Croix, which joins the Mississippi opposite 
Hastings, down the Mississippi from all the region 
above the Falls of St. Anthony ; but now it is a 
seedy place. The houses have a forlorn look, and 
the three hundred Irish and Germans that make 
up the bulk of the population are not of the class 
that lay the foundations of empires, or make the 
wilderness bud and blossom with roses ; they take 
life easy, and let to-day wait on to-morrow. 

Fort SnelHng, admirably located, looms grand- 
ly above the high steep bluff of the northern 
bank of the Minnesota Eiver. It was one of the 
strongest posts on the frontier, but it is as useless 
now as a last year's swaUow's-nest. The frontier 
is three hundred miles farther on. 

Upon the early maps of Minnesota I find a mag- 
nificent city occupying the surrounding ground. 
It was surveyed and plotted, but St. Paul and 
Minneapolis got ahead, and the city of Snelling 
has no place in history. 

We approach St. Paul from the south. Stepping 
from the cars we find ourselves on the lowlands of 
the Mississippi, with a high bluff south of us, and 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 17 

another on the north bank, both rismg perpendicii- 
laiiy from the river. We ride over a long wooden 
bridge, one end of which rests on the low land by 
the railroad station, and the other on the high 
northern bluff, so that the structure is inclined at 
an angle of about twenty degrees, like the drive- 
way to a New England barn where the floor is 
nearly up to the high beams. We are in a city 
which in 1849, twenty years ago, had a population 
of eight hundred and forty, but which now has 
an estimated population of twenty-five thousand. 
Here that powerful tribe of l^orthern Indians, the 
Dakotas, had their capital, — a cave in the sand- 
stone bluffs, which was the council-chamber of the 
tribe. Upon the bluff now stands the capital of 
the State, and the sanguine citizens believe that 
the city is to be the commercial metropolis of the 
Northwest. A few months ago I was on the other 
side of the globe, where civilization is at a stand- 
still ; where communities exist, but scarcely change ; 
where decay is quite as probable as growth ; where 
advancement is the exception, and not the rule. To 
ride through the streets of St. Paul ; to behold its 
spacious warehouses, its elegant edifices, stores 
piled with the goods of all lands, the products of 
all climes, — furs from Hudson Bay, oranges from 
Messina, teas from China, coffee from Brazil, silks 
from Paris, and all the products of industry from 
our own land; to behold the streets alive with 



18 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

people, crowded with farmers' wagons laden with 
wheat and flour ; to read the signs, '' Young Men's 
Christian Association," " St. Paul Library Associa- 
tion " ; to see elegant school-edifices and churches, 
beautiful private residences surrounded by lawns 
and adorned with works of art, — to see this in 
contrast with what we have so lately witnessed, 
and to think that this is the development of 
American civilization, going on now as never 
before, and destined to continue till all this wide 
region is to be thus dotted over with centres of 
influence and power, sends an indescribable thrill 
through our veins. It is not merely that we are 
Americans, but because in this land Christian civi- 
lization is attaining the highest development of all 
time. The people of St. Paul may justly take 
pride in what they have already accomplished, and 
they also have reason to look forward with confi- 
dence to tlie future. 

The county is quite small, containing only four 
and a half townships. The soil is poor, a sandy 
loam, of not much account for farming purposes, 
but being at the head of steamboat navigation a 
good start was obtained ; and now that railroads 
are superseding steamboats, St. Paul reaches out 
her iron arms in every direction, — up the ^lissis- 
sippi to St. Cloud, westward through Minneapolis 
to the Pted Ptiver of the ^orth, southwest to touch 
the Missouri at Sioux City, due south over the line 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 19 

by which we reached the city, down the river to- 
wards Chicago, and northeast to Lake Superior. 
As a spider extends its threads, so St. Paul, or per- 
haps, more properly speaking, St. Paul and Minne- 
apolis together, are throwing out their lines of 
communication, making themselves the centre of 
the great Northwest systems of railways. The in- 
terests of St. Paul are mercantile, those of Minne- 
apolis manufacturing. They are nearly five hun- 
dred miles distant from Chicago, — far enough to 
be an independent commercial, manufacturing, and 
distributing centre. That such is to be their des- 
tiny cannot be doubted. 

The outfit of our party had been prepared at 
Minneapolis ; and a large number of gentlemen 
from that city made their appearance at St. Paul, 
to convey us to the town in their own private 
carriages. 

It is a charming ride that we have along the 
eastern bank of the Mississippi, which pours its 
miglity flood, — mighty even here, though so far 
away from the sea, — rolling and thundering far 
below us in the chasm which it has worn in the 
solid rock. 

On our riolit hand are fields of wavino- OTain, and 
white cottages half hidden in groves of oak and 
maple. We see Xew England thrift and enter- 
prise, for the six States east of the Hudson liave 
been sending their wide-awake sons and daughters 



20 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

to this section for the last twenty years. The gen- 
tleman with whom we are riding came here from 
the woods of Maine, a lumberman from the Penob- 
scot, and has been the architect of his own for- 
tune. He knows all about the Upper Mississippi, 
its tributaries, and the chain of lakes lying north- 
west of Lake Superior. He is Mayor of Minne- 
apolis, a substantial citizen, his hand ready for every 
good work, — for the building of schools and 
churches, for charity and benevolence ; but on the 
Upper Mississippi he wears a red shirt, eats pork 
and beans, and sleeps on pine boughs. He directs 
the labor of hundreds of w^ood-choppers and rafts- 
men. 

How different this from what we see in other 
lands ! I find my pen runs on contrasts. How 
can one help it after seeing that gorgeous and 
lumbering old carriage in which the Lord Mayor 
of London rides from Guildhall to Westminster ? 
The Lord Mayor himself appears in a scarlet 
cloak not half so becoming as a red shirt. He 
wears a massive gold chain, and a hat which w^ould 
be most in place on the stage of a theatre, and 
which would make him a guy in any American 
town. ]N'ot so do the Lord Mayors of the iN'ortli- 
west appear in public. They understand practical 
life. It is one of the characteristics of our demo- 
cratic government that it makes people practical 
in all things. 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 21 

In 1865 tlie town of Minneapolis contained 
only 4,607 inhabitants, but the population by the 
census of the present year is 13,080. 

The fall in the river at this point is sixty-four 
feet, furnishing 120,000 horse-power, — more than 
sufficient to drive every mill-wheel and factory in 
New England, and, according to Wheelock's Eeport, 
greater than the whole motive-power — steam and 
water — employed in textile manufactures in Eng- 
land in 1 8 5 0. Thirteen flouring-mills, fourteen saw- 
mills, two woollen-mills, and two paper-mills, are 
abeady erected. Six million dollars have been in- 
vested in manufacturing at this point. The only 
difficulty to be encountered is the preservation of 
the falls in their present position. Beneath the 
slate rock over which the torrent pours is a strata 
of soft sandstone, which rapidly wears away. 
Measures have been taken, however, to preserve 
the cataract in its present condition, by construct- 
ing an apron to carry the water some distance 
beyond the verge of the fall and thus prevent the 
breaking away of the rock. 

No one can behold the natural advantages at 
Minneapolis without coming to the conclusion that 
it is to be one of the great manufacturing cities of 
the world if the fall can be kept in its present 
position. Cotton can be loaded upon steamers 
at Memphis, and discharged at St. Paul. The cli- 
mate here is exceedingly favorable for the manu- 



22 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

facturing of cotton goods. The lumber-mills by 
and by will give place to other manufactures, and 
Minneapolis will rank with Lowell or Fall Eiver. 

Our ride brings us to St. Anthony on the east 
bank of the river, where we behold the Mississippi 
roaring and tumbling over the slate-stone ledges, 
and hear the buzzing and humming of the ma- 
chinery in the saw^-mills. 

St. Anthony was one of the earliest - settled 
towns in the State. Its projectors were Southern 
men. Streets were laid out, stores erected, a great 
hotel built, and extravagant prices asked for land, 
but the owners of INIinneapolis offered lots at 
cheaper rates, and found purchasers. The w^ar 
came on, and the proprietors of St. Anthony being 
largely from the South, the place ceased to grow, 
while its rival on the western sliore moved steadily 
onward in a prosperous career. But St. Anthony 
is again advancing, for many gentlemen doing 
business in Minneapolis reside there. The inter- 
ests of the two places are identical, and will ad- 
vance together. 

How can one describe what is indescribable ? 
I can only speak of this city as situated on a 
beautiful plain, with the Mississippi thundering 
over a cataract with a power sufficient to build up 
half a dozen Lowells ; with a country behind it 
where every acre of land as far as the eye can see, 
and a hundred or a thousand times farther, is capa- 



FROM CHICAGO TO MINNEAPOLIS. 23 

ble of cultivation and of supporting a population as 
dense as that of Belgium or China. Wide streets, 
costly school-houses, church spires, a commu- 
nity in which the New England element largely 
predominates, — a city where every other door 
does not open to a lager-beer saloon, as in some 
Western towns ; where the sound of the saw and 
the hammer, and the click of the mason's trowel 
and sledge, are heard from morning till night ; 
where the streets are filled with waoons from the 
country, bringing in grain and carrying back lum- 
ber, with the farmer, his wife and buxom daughter, 
and tow-headed, bright-faced little boys perched 
on top — such are the characteristics of Minne- 
apolis. 

There was a time when Pegasus was put in har- 
ness, and the ancients, according to fable, tried to 
put Hercules to work. If those days of classic story 
have gone by, better ones have come, for the peo- 
ple of Minneapolis have got the Father of Waters 
in harness. He is cutting out one hnndred million 
feet of lumber per annum here. I can hear him 
spinning his saws. He is turning a score of mill- 
stones, and setting a million or two of spindles in 
motion, and pretty soon some of the citizens in- 
tend to set him to weaving bags and cloth by the 
hundred thousand yards ! Only a tithe of his 
strength is yet laid out. These men, reared in 
the East, and developed in the West, will make 



24 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the old Father work for them henceforth. He will 
not be allowed to idle away his time by leaping 
and laughing year in and year out over yonder 
cataract. He must work for the good of the 
human race. They will use him for the building 
of a great mart of industry, — for the erection of 
houses and homes, the abodes of comfort and 
happiness and of joyful and peaceful life. 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 25 

CHAPTER II. 

ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 

ST. CLOUD was the rendezvous of the party, 
where a grand ovation awaited ns, — a band 
of music at the station, a dinner at the hotel, a 
ride to Sauk Eapids, two miles above the town. 

St. Cloud is eighty miles above St. Paul, situated 
on the west bank of the river, and is reached by 
the St. Paul and Pacific Eailroad. The goods of 
the Hudson Bay Company pass through the town. 
Three hundred tons per annum are shipped from 
Liverpool to Montreal, from Montreal to Milwau- 
kie, from Milwaukie by rail to this point, and 
from hence are transported by oxen to the Red 
River, taken down that stream on a small steamer 
to Lake AYinnipeg, then sent in boats and canoes 
up the Assinniboin, the Saskatchawan, and to all 
the numerous trading-posts between Winnipeg and 
the Arctic Ocean. 

We are getting towards the frontier. We come 
upon frontiersmen in leggings, slouch hat, and fur 
coat, — carrying their rifles. Indians are riding 
their j)onies. Wigwams are seen in the groves. 
Carts are here from Pembina and Fort Garry after 
supplies. 

2 



26 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

And yet, in the suburbs of the town we see a 
large Normal School building just completed. A 
magnificent bridge costing S 40,000 spans the Mis- 
sissippi. At Sauk Eapids the river rolls over a 
granite ledge, and a chartered water-power com- 
pany is erecting a dam, constructing a canal, and 
laying the foundations for the second great man- 
ufacturing city upon the Mississippi. 

This section has been a favorite locality for 
German emigrants. Nearly one half of the inhab- 
itants of Stearns County, of which St. Cloud is the 
county-seat, are Germans. Here we bid good by 
to the locomotive and take the saddle instead, with 
light carriages for occasional change. 

We leave hotels behind, and are to enjoy the 
pleasures of camp-life. 

Our party as made up consists of the following 
persons : — 

Grov. J. Gregory Smith, St. Albans, Yt. 
W. C. Smith, M. C. 
W. H. Lord, D. D., Montpelier, Yt. 
F. E. WooDBRiDGE, YergeniiGs, Yt. 
S. W. Thayer, M. D., Burlington, Yt. 
Hon. R. D. Rice, Augusta, Me. 

P. COBURN, 

E. F. Johnson, Middletown, Conn, 

C. C. Coffin, Boston. 

P. \V. Holmes, New York City. 

A. B. Bayless, Jr., New York City. 

W. R. Marshall, St. Paul, Gov. of Minnesota. 

E. M. Wilson, M. C, Minneapolis. 

Q. A. Brackett, " 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOXD. 27 

The list is headed by Ex-Governor Smith, Presi- 
dent of the Northern Pacific Pailroad and of the 
Vermont Central. It fell to his lot to be Chief 
]\Iagistrate of the Green Monntain State during 
the rebellion, and among all the loyal governors 
there was no one that excelled him in energy and 
executive force. He was here, there, and every- 
where, — one day in Vermont, the next in Wash- 
ington, the third in the rear of the army looking 
after the wounded. I remember seeing him at 
Fredericksburg during those terrible weeks that 
followed the struggles at the Wilderness and 
Spottsylvania, — directing his assistants, laboring 
with his own hands, — hunting up the sick and 
wounded, giving up his own cot, sleeping on the 
bare floor, or not sleeping at all, — cheering the 
despondent, writing sympathetic letters to fathers 
and mothers whose sons were in the hospital, or 
who had given their lives to their country. He 
has taken hold of this great enterprise — the con- 
struction of a railroad across the continent from 
the Lakes to the Pacific Ocean — with like zeal 
and energy, and has organized this expedition to 
explore the country between Lake Su]5erior and 
the ^lissouri Eiver. 

Judge Eice is from Maine. He is President of 
the Portland and Kennebec Eailroad, and a director 
of the Northern Pacific. Before engaging in the 
management of railroads he held, for sixteen years. 



28 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the honorable and responsible position of Associate 
Judge of the Supreme Court of Maine. Well 
versed in law, and holding the scales of justice 
evenly, his decisions have been regarded as wise 
and just. 

Mr. Johnson is the Chief Engineer of the road, 
one of the ablest in his profession in the country. 
As long ago as 1853, before the government sur- 
veys were made, he published a pamphlet upon 
this future highway to the Pacific, in which he 
discussed with great ability the physical geogra- 
phy of the country, not only from Lake Superior 
to Puget Sound, but the entire region between the 
Mississippi and the Pacific. The explorations that 
have since been made correspond almost exactly 
with his statements. 

The President of the company has showed fore- 
thought for the health, comfort, and pleasure of the 
party, by taking along two of the most genial men 
in l^ew England, — Dr. Thayer, of Burlington, to 
cure us of all the ills that flesh is heir to, whose 
broad smiling face is itself a most excellent medi- 
cine, whose stories are quite as good as his pills 
and powders for keeping our digestion all right ; 
and Eev. Dr. Lord, from Montpelier, for many years 
pastor of one of the largest churches in the State. 

"With a doctor to keep our bodies right, with a 
minister to point out the narrow way that leads to 
a brighter world, and both of them as warm- 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 29 

hearted and genial as sunshine, we surely ought to 
be in good health. 

]\Ir. Holmes, of ISTew York, is an old campaigner. 
He had experienced the rough and tumble of life 
on the Upper Missouri, with his rifle for a com- 
panion, the earth his bed, the broad expanse of sky 
his tent. 

Governor Marshall, Chief Magistrate of Minne- 
sota, Mr. Wilson, member of Congress from the 
same State, and Mr. Brackett, of Minneapolis, 
w^ere in Sibley's expedition against the Indians, and 
are accustomed to all the pleasures and hardships 
of a campaign. They are to explore the region 
lying between the Eed Eiver of the North and 
the Great Bend of the Missouri. Mr. Bayless, 
of New York, accompanies the party to enjoy the 
freedom and excitement of frontier life. Nor are 
we without other company. Some of the clergy- 
men of Minnesota, like their brethren in other 
parts of the country, turn their backs on civiliza- 
tion during the summer months, and spend a few- 
weeks with Nature for a teacher. It is related 
that the Eev. Dr. Bethune made it a point to visit 
Moosehead Lake in Maine every season, to medi- 
tate in solitude and eat onions 1 He not only 
loved them, but had ojreat faith in their strensjth- 
ening powers. His ministry was a perpetual Lent 
so far as onions were concerned, and it was only 
when he broke away from society and was lost to 



30 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the world in the forest that he could partake freely 
of his favorite vegetable. 

Travelling the same road, and keeping iis com- 
pany, are Eev. Mr. and Mrs. Fuller, of Eochester, 
and Eev. jMr. and Mrs. Williams, and Mr. and 
Miss Wheaton, of Northfield, Minn. They have a 
prairie wagon with a covered top, drawn by two 
horses, in which is packed a tent, with pots, 
kettles, pans, dishes, flour, pork, beans, canned 
fruit, hams, butter, bed and bedding. They have 
saddle-horses for excursions, and carry rifles, shot- 
guns, and fishing-tackle. Pulpit, people and par- 
sonage, hoop-skirts, stove-pipe hats, work and 
care, are left behind. The women can handle the 
fishing-rod or rifle. It may seem to ladies unac- 
customed to country life as a great letting down 
of dignity on the part of these women of the 
West to enter upon such an expedition, but they 
are in search of health. They are not aiming 
to be Amazons. A few weeks upon the prairies, 
and they will return well browned, but healthful 
and ruo-oed, and as attractive and charming^ as the 
fair Maud who raked hay and dreamed of what 
might have been. 

Our first night is spent at " Camp Thunder," 
and why it is so named will presently be appar- 
ent. It is nearly night when we leave St. Cloud 
for a four-mile ride to our quarters. 

We can see in the rays of the setting sun, as 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 31 

we ride over the prairie, our village of white tents 
pitched by the roadside, and our wagons parked 
near by. It is an exhilarating scene, bringing 
to remembrance the many tented fields during the 
war, and those soul-stirring days when the armies 
of the Kepublic marched under their great leader 
to victory. 

The sun goes down through a blood-colored 
haze, throwing its departing beams upon a bank 
of leaden clouds that lie alon^j the horizon. Old 
salts say that such sunsets in the tropics are fol- 
lowed by storms. 

Through the evening, while sitting in the doors 
of our tents and talking of camp-life and its pleas- 
ant experiences, we can see faint flashes of light- 
ning along the horizon. The leaden clouds grow 
darker, and rise slowly up the sky. Through the 
deepening haze we catch faint glimpses of celestial 
architecture, — castles, towers, massive walls, and 

"Looming bastions fringed with fire." 

Far away rolls the heavy thunder, — so far that 
it seems the diapason of a distant organ. We lose 
sight of the gorgeous palaces, temples, and cathe- 
drals of the upper air, or we see them only when 
the bright flashes of lightning illume the sky. 

It is past midnight, — Ave have been asleep, 
and are wakened by the sudden bursting of the 
storm. The canvas roof and walls of our house 
flap suddenly in the wind. The cords are drawn 



32 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

taut against the tent-pins. • The roof rises, set- 
tles, surges up and down, to and fro, the walls 
belly in and then out against the swaying frame. 
The rain comes in great drops, in small drops, in 
drifting . spray, rattling upon the canvas like a 
hundred thousand muskets, — just as they rattled 
and rolled on that awful day at the Wilderness 
when the two greatest armies ever gathered on this 
continent met in deadly conflict. 

All the while the tent is as bright with light- 
ning as with the sun at noonday. By the side of 
my cot is a book which I have been reading ; tak- 
ing it in my hand, I read the finest print, noted the 
hour, minute, and position of the second-hand upon 
my watch. 

Looking out through the opening of the fly, I 
behold the distant woodland, the fences, the beard- 
ed grain laid prostrate by the blast, the rain-drops 
falling aslant through the air, the farm-house a 
half-mile distant, — all revealed by the red glare 
of the lightning. All the landscape is revealed. 
For an instant I am in darkness, then all appears 
ac^ain beneath the lurid lio'ht. 

The storm grows wilder. The gale becomes a 
tempest, and increases to a tornado. The thunder 
crashes around, above, so near that the crackling 
follows in an instant the blinding flash. It rat- 
tles, rolls, roars, and explodes like bursting bombs. 

The tent is reeling. Knowing what will be the 




IN THE SrORM 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 33 

result, I hurry on my clothing, and have just time 
to seize an india-rubber coat before the pins are 
pulled from the ground. I spring to the pole, de- 
termined to hold on to the last. 

Though the lightning is so fearful, and the mo- 
ment well calculated to arouse solemn thoughts, 
we cannot restrain our laughter Avhen two occu- 
pants of an adjoining tent rush into mine in the 
condition of men who have had a sousing in a 
pond. The wind pulled their tent ujd by the 
roots, and slapped the wet canvas down upon them 
in a twinkling. They crawled out like muskrats 
from their holes, — their night-shirts fit for mops, 
their clothing ready for washing, their boots full 
of water, their hats limp and damp and ready for 
moulding into corrugated tiles. 

It is a ludicrous scene. I am the central figure 
inside the tent, — holding to the pole with all my 
might, bareheaded, barefooted, my body at an 
angle of forty-five degrees, my feet sinking into 
the black mire, — the dripping canvas swinging 
and swaying, now lifted by the wind and now 
flapping in my face, and drenching anew two 
members of Congress, who sit upon my broken- 
down bed, shivering while wringing out their 
shirts ! 

Wlien the fury of the storm is over, I rush out 
to drive down the pins, and find that my tent is the 
only one in the encampment that is not wholly 
2* c 



34 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

prostrated. The members of the party are stand- 
ing like shirted ghosts in the storm. The rotund 
form of our M. D. is \\Tapped in the oil-cloth 
table-cover. For the moment he is a hydropath, 
and complacently surveys the wreck of tents. The 
rain falls on his bare head, the water streams from 
his gray locks, and runs like a river down his 
broad back ; but he does not bow before the blast, 
he breasts it bravely. I do not hear him, but I 
can see by his features that he is silently smging 
the Sunday-school song, — 

** I '11 stand the storm, 
It Avon't be loug." 

Tents, beds, bedding, clothing, all are soppy 
and moppy, and the ground a quagmire. AVe 
go ankle deep into the mud. We might navigate 
the prairies in a boat. 

Our purveyor, Mr. Brackett, an old campaigner, 
knows just what to do to make us comfortable. 
He has a dry tent in one of the wagons, which, 
when the rain has ceased, is quickly set up. His 
cook soon has his coffee-pot bubbling, and with 
hot coffee and a roaring fire we are none the worse 
for the drenching. 

The storm has spent its fury, and is passing 
away, but the heavens are all aglow. Broad 
flashes sweep across the sky, flame up to the ze- 
nith, or quiver along the horizon. Bolt after bolt 
falls earthward, or flies from the north, south, east. 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 35 

and west, — from all points of tlie compass, — 
branching into beautiful forms, spreading out into 
threads and fibres of light, each tipped with golden 
balls or beads of briglitest hue, seen a moment, 
then gone forever. 

Flash and flame, bolt and bar, bead, ball, and 
line, follow each other in quick succession, or all 
appear at once in indescribable beauty and fear- 
ful grandeur. We can only gaze in wonder and 
admiration, though all but blinded by the vivid 
flashes, and though each bolt may be a messenger 
of death, — though in the twinkling of an eye the 
spirit may be stricken from its present tabernacle 
and sent upon its returnless flight. The display, 
so magnificent and grand, has its only counterpart 
in the picture Avhich imagination paints of Sinai 
or the final judgment. 

In an adjoining county the storm was attended 
by a whirlwind. Houses were demolished and 
several persons killed. It was terrifying to be in 
it, to hear the deafening thunder ; but it was a sight 
worth seeing, — that glorious lighting up of the 
arch of heai^en. 

It required half a day of bright sunshine to put 
things in trim after the tornado, and then on Sat- 
urday afternoon the party pushed on to Cold 
Spring and encamped on the bank of Sauk Eiver 
for the Sabbath. 

The camp was named " Jay Cooke," in honor of 



36 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the energetic banker wlio is the financial agent of 
the Northern Pacific Eailroad Company. Sweet, 
calm, and peaceful the hours. Eeligious services 
were held, conducted by Eev. Dr. Lord, who had 
a flour-barrel and a candle-box before him for a 
pulpit ; a congregation of teamsters, with people 
from the little village near by, and the gentlemen 
composing our party, some of us seated on boxes, 
but most of us sitting upon the ground. 'Not were 
we without a choir. Everybody sung Old Hun- 
dred ; and though some of us could only sound 
one note, and that straight along from beginning 
to end, like the drone of a bagpij)e, it went glo- 
riously. Old Hundred never was sung with better 
spirit, though there was room for improvement of 
the understanding, especially in the base. The 
teamsters, after service, hunted turtle-eggs on the 
bank of the river, and one of them brought in a 
hatful, which were cooked for supper. 

Our course from Cold Spring was up the Sauk 
Valley to Sauk Centre, a lively town with an excel- 
lent water-power. The town is about six years old, 
but its population already numbers fifteen hundred. 
The country around it is one of the most beautiful 
and fertile imaginable. The Sauk Eiver is the 
southern boundary of the timbered lands west of the 
Mississippi. As we look southward, over the mag- 
nificent expanse, w^e see farm-houses and grain- 
fields, but on the north bank are dense forests. 




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CM 


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ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 37 

The prairie lands are already taken up by settlers, 
while there are many thousand acres of the wood- 
ed portion of Stearns County yet in the posses- 
sion of the government. The emigrant can raise 
a crop of wheat the second year after beginning a 
farm upon the prairies, while if he goes into the 
woods, there is the slow process of clearing and 
digging out of stumps, and a great deal of hard 
labor before he has any returns. Those prairie 
lands that lie in the immediate vicinity of tim- 
ber are most valuable. The valley of the Sauk, 
besides being exceedingly fertile, has timber near 
at hand, and has had a rapid development. It is 
an inviting section for the capitalist, trader, me- 
chanic, or farmer, and its growth promises to be as 
rapid in the future as it has been since 1865. 

A two days' ride over a magnificent prairie 
brings us to White Bear Lake. If we had trav- 
elled due west from St. Cloud, along the township 
lines, sixty miles, we should have found ourselves 
at its southern shore instead of its northern. Our 
camp for the night was pitched on the hills over- 
looking tliis sheet of water. The Yale of Tern^^e 
could not have been fairer, and Arcadia had no 
lovelier scene, than that which we gazed upon 
from the green slope around our tents, blooming 
with wild roses, lilies, petunias, and phlox. 

The lake stretches southward a distance of 
twelve miles, indented here and there by a wooded 



38 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

promontory, with sandy beaches sweeping in mag- 
nificent curves, with a patch of Woodland on tlie 
eastern shore, and a green fringe of stately oaks 
and elms around its entire circumference. As far 
as the vision extends we behold limitless fields, 
whose verdure changes in varying hues with every 
passing cloud, and wanting only a background of 
highlands to make it as lovely as Windermere, the 
most enchanting of all the lakes of Old England. 

At our feet was the little town of Glenwood. 
We looked down upon a hotel with the stars and 
stripes waving above it ; upon a neat school-house 
with children playing around its doors ; upon a 
cluster of twenty or thirty white houses sur- 
rounded by gardens and flower-beds. Three years 
ago this was a solitude. 

There is a sail-boat upon the lake, which some 
gentlemen of our party chartered for a fishing-ex- 
cursion. Thinking perhaps we should get more 
fish by dividing our force, I took a skiff", and ob- 
tained a stalwart Norweoian to row it. Almost as 
soon as my hook touched the water I felt a tug at 
the other end of the line, and in came a pickerel, 
— a three-pounder ! The Norwegian rowed slowly 
along the head of the lake, and one big fellow after 
another was pulled into the boat. There was 
scarcely a breath of wind, and the sails were idly 
flapping against the masts of the larger boat, where 
my friends were whiling away the time as best 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. ISS 

they could, tantalized by seeing that I was having 
all the fun. They could only crack their rifles at 
a loon, or at the flocks of ducks swimming along 
the shore. 

But there was rare sport at hand. I discovered 
an enormous turtle lying upon the surface of the 
water as if asleep. " Approach gently," I said to 
the Norwegian. He dipped his oars softly, and 
sent the skiff stern foremost towards the turtle, 
who was puffing and blowing like a wheezy old 
gentleman sound asleep. 

One more push of the oar and he will be mine. 
Too late ! We have lost him. Down he goes. I 
can see him four feet beneath us, clawing off. No, 
he is coming uj). He rises to the surface. I grasp 
his tail with both hands, and jerk with all my 
might. The boat dips, but a backward spring 
saves it from going over, and his majesty of White 
Bear Lake, the oldest inhabitant of its silver wa- 
ters, weighing forty-six pounds, — so venerable that 
he wears a garden-bed of grass and weeds upon 
his back — is floundering in the half-filled skiff. 

The boatman springs to his feet, stands on the 
seat with uplifted oar, undecided whether to jump 
overboard or to fight the monster who is making 
at his legs with open jaws. 

By an adroit movement of an oar I whirl him 
upon his back, and hold him down while the Nor- 
wegian paddles slowly to the beach. 



40 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

The captive rides in a meal-bag the remainder 
of the day, hissing now and then, and striving to 
regain his liberty. 

Ah ! is n't that a delicious supper which we sit 
down to out upon the prairies on the shores of 
Lightning Lake, — beyond the borders of civiliza- 
tion ! It is not mock turtle, but the genuine arti- 
cle, such as aldermen eat. True, we have tin cups 
and plates, and other primitive table furniture, but 
hunger sharpens the appetite, and food is as tooth- 
some as if served on gold-bordered china. Be- 
sides turtle-soup we have fresh fish and boiled 
duck. Who is there that would not like to find 
such fare inside the borders of civilization ? 

Beyond Pope we entered Grant County, contain- 
ing 268,000 acres of land, nearly all open to set- 
tlement, and through which the main line of the 
St. Paul and Pacific Eailroad will be constructed 
the present year. The population of the entire 
county probably does not exceed five hundred, 
who are mostly Swedes and Norwegians. It is on 
the ridge, or, rather, the gentle undulating prairie, 
between the waters of the Eed Ptiver of the 
North and the Chippewa Eiver, an affluent of the 
Minnesota. We passed between two small lakes ; 
the waters of one find their way to the Gulf of 
Mexico, the other to the Arctic Sea. 

Our second Sabbath camp was upon the bank of 
the Eed Eiver of the North, — a beautiful stream. 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 41 

winding its peaceful way through a country as 
fertile as the Delta of the Nile. 

For two days we had journeyed over rolling prai- 
rie, seeing no inhabitant ; but on Saturday after- 
noon we reached the great thoroughfare leading 
from the Mississippi to the Eed Eiver, — travelled 
by the Fort Abercrombie stage, and by the Pem- 
bina and Fort Garry carts, by government trains 
and the ox-teams that transport the suppHes of the 
Hudson Bay Company. 

Sitting there upon the bank of the Eed Eiver 
amid the tall, rank grasses, and watching the flow- 
ing stream, my thoughts went with its tide towards 
the Northern Sea. It has its rise a hundred miles 
or more north of us, near Lake Itasca, the source 
of the Mississippi, flows southward to this point, 
turns westward here, is joined below by a stream 
issuing from Lake Traverse, its most southern 
source, and then flows due north to Lake Winni- 
peg, a distance altogether of about five hundred 
miles. 

It is the great southern artery of a water-sys- 
tem that lies almost wholly beyond the jurisdic- 
tion of the United States. 

The Assinniboine joins it just before reaching 
Lake Winnipeg, and up that stream we may 
steam due west two hundred and thirty miles to 
Fort Ellis. From Winnipeg we may pass eastward 
to the intricate Eainy Lake system towards Supe- 



42 THE SEAT OF EMPIKE. 

rior, or westward into Lakes Manitoloa and Winni- 
pegosis, whicli together contain as much water as 
Lake Erie. 

Sailing along the western shore of Lake "Winni- 
peg two hundred miles, we reach the mouth of the 
Saskatchawan, large enough to be classed as one 
of the great rivers of the continent. 

Professor Hind, of Toronto, who conducted a 
government exploring-party through the country 
northwest of Lake Superior^ says : " The Saskatch- 
awan, which gathers the waters from a country 
greater in extent than the vast region drained by 
the St. Lawrence and all its tributaries, from Lake 
Superior to the Gulf, is navigable for more than a 
thousand miles of its course, with the single ex- 
ception of a few rapids near its confluence with 
Lake Winnipeg." 

Professor Hind travelled from Fort Garry north- 
west over the prairies towards the Kocky Moun- 
tains, and gives the following description of his 
first view of the stream. He says : — 

" The first view, six hundred miles from the 
lake, filled me with astonishment and admiration, 
— nearly half a mile broad, flowing with a swift 
current, and still I was three hundred and fifty 
miles from the mountains." 

The small steamer now plying on the Eed River 
might, during the season of high water, make its 
way from Fort Abercrombie down this river, then 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 43 

throngli Lake Winnipeg, and up the Saskatchawan 
westward to the base of the Eocky Mountains, — 
a distance altogether of sixteen hundred miles. 

We are in the latitude of the continental water- 
system. If we travel along the parallel eastward, 
one hundred miles will bring us to the Mississippi 
at Crow Wing, another hundred will take us to 
Lake Superior, where we may embark on a propel- 
ler of five hundred tons and make our way down 
through the lakes and the St. Lawrence to Liver- 
pool, or any other foreign port ; or travelling west 
three hundred miles will bring us to the Missouri, 
where we may take one of the steamers plying on 
that stream and go up to Fort Benton under the 
shadow of the Eocky Mountains. 

Two hundred and fifty miles farther by land, 
through the mining region of Montana, will bring 
us to the navigable waters of the Columbia, down 
which we may glide to the Pacific. 

Nowhere in the Eastern hemisphere is there such 
a succession of lakes and navigable rivers, and no 
other country exhibits such an area of arable land 
so intersected by fresh-water streams. 

It would be an easy matter by canals to connect 
the Eed Elver, the Saskatchawan, and Lake Win- 
nipeg with the Mississippi. We can take a canoe 
from this point and paddle up to Otter-Tail Lake, 
and there, by carrying it a mile or so over a 
sand-ridge, launch it on Leaf Eiver, an affluent of 



44 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the Crow- Wing, and so reach the Father of Waters. 
We may do even better than that. Instead of 
paddling up stream we may float down with the 
current a few miles to the outlet of Lake Traverse, 
row across the lake, and from that into Big Stone 
Lake, which is the source of the Minnesota Eiver, 
and by this route reach the Mississippi below 
Minneapolis. Boats carrying two tons have fre- 
quently passed from one river to the other during 
the season of high water. It would not be diffi- 
cult to construct a canal by which steamers might 
pass from the Mississippi to the base of the Eocky 
Mountains in British Columbia. Eailroads are 
superseding canals, and it is not likely that any 
such improvement of the water-way will be at- 
tempted during the present generation. 

But a glance at the river and lake systems en- 
ables us to obtain a idew of the physical features 
of the country. We see that the northwestern 
portion of the continent is an extended plain. 
The Eed Eiver here by our encampment is about 
nine hundred and sixty feet above the sea. If we 
were to float down to Lake Winnipeg, we should 
find that sheet of water three hundred feet lower. 

Our camp is pitched to-day about ten miles west 
of the 96th meridian. If we were to travel south 
from this point 350 miles, we should reach Omaha, 
which is 946 feet above the sea, so that if we were 
sitting on the bank of the Missouri at that point, 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 45 

we should be just about as high above tide-water 
as we are while lolling here in the tall rank grass. 
By going from Omaha to San Francisco over the 
Pacific Railroad, we see the elevations of the coun- 
try ; then by striking westward from this point to 
the head-waters of the Missouri, and then down 
the Columbia^ we shall see at once the physical 
features of the two sections. The engineers of the 
Pacific Eailroad, after gaining the top of the bluff 
behind Omaha, have a long and apparently level 
sweep before them. Yet there is a gradually as- 
cending grade. Four hundred and eighty-five miles 
west of Omaha we come to the 104th meridian, at 
an elevation of 4,861 feet. If we go west from 
this point to that meridian, we shall strike it at 
the mouth of the Yellowstone, 1,970 feet above 
tide- water. ISTear the 105th meridian is the high- 
est point on the Union Pacific, at Sherman, which 
is 8,235 feet above the sea. Three hundred miles 
beyond Sherman, at Green River, is the lowest 
point between Omaha and the descent into Salt 
Lake Valley, 6,112 feet above the ocean level. At 
that point we are about twenty-six miles west of 
the 110th meridian, ^ow going northward t» the 
valley of the Missouri once more, we find that Fort 
Benton is about the same number of miles west 
of the same meridian, but the fort is only 2,747 
feet above the sea. 

Just beyond Fort Benton we come to the Rocky 



46 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Mountains, — the only range to be crossed between 
Lake Superior and the Columbia. We enter the 
Deer Lodge Pass near the 112th meridian, where 
our barometer will show us that we are about five 
thousand feet above the sea. We find that the 
miners at work on the western sloj)e have cut a 
canal through the pass, and have turned the waters 
of the Missouri into the Columbia. The pass is 
so level that the traveller can hardly tell when 
he has reached the dividing line. 

Going south now along the meridian, we shall 
find that between Green Eiver and Salt Lake lies 
the Wasatch Kange, which the Union Pacific cross- 
es at an elevation of 7,463 feet at Aspen Station, 
940 miles west of Omaha. From that point the 
line descends to Salt Lake, which is 4,220 feet 
above the sea. Westward of this, on the 115th 
meridian, 1,240 miles from Omaha, we reach the 
top of Humboldt Mountains, 6,169 feet above tide- 
water, while the elevation is only 1,500 feet on the 
same meridian in the valley of the Columbia. 

At Humboldt Lake, 1,493 miles west of Omaha, 
the rails are at the lowest level of the mountain 
region, 4,047 feet above the sea. This is a little 
west of the 119th meridian, about the same longi- 
tude as Walla Walla on the great plain of the Co- 
lumbia, which is less than 400 feet above the sea. 

WestwaTd of Humboldt Lake the Central Line 
rises to the summit of the Sierra Nevadas, crossing 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. 47 

tliem 7,042 feet above the sea, then descending at 
the rate of 116 feet to the mile into the valley of 
the Sacramento. 

Now going back to the plains, to the town of 
Sidney, which is 410 miles west of Omaha, we find 
the altitude there the same as at Humboldt Lake. 
This level does not show itself again till we are 
well down on the western slope of the Sierra Ne- 
vada Eange. The entire country between Omaha 
and Sacramento, with the exception of about 510 
miles, is above the level of 4,000 feet, while on the 
line westward from the point where I am indul- 
ging in this topographical revery there are not 
thirty miles reaching that altitude. 

With this glance at the configuration of the con- 
tinent I might make an isometric map in the sand 
with my fingers, heaping it up to represent the 
Black Hills at Sherman, a lower ridge to indicate 
the Wasatch Eange, a depression to show the Salt 
Lake Yalley, and then another liigh ridge to repre- 
sent the Sierra Nevadas. I might trace the chan- 
nel of the Missouri and the Columbia, and show 
that most of this territory is a great plain sloping 
northward, — that it is lower at Winnipeg than it 
is here, as low here as it is at Omaha. 

Taking this glance at the physical features of 
the northern and central portions of the continent, 
I can see that nature has adapted all this vast 
area drained by the Missouri and Yellowstone and 



48 




THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Sacramento and Portland. 

- Sierra Nevada, 7,042 feet. 

Humboldt Lake, 4,047 feet. 

••- Humboldt Mountains, 6,169 feet. 



Clark's Eiver, 3,700 feet. 
Salt Lake, 4,220 feet. 
Deer Lodge Pass, 5,000 feet. 

Wasatch Range, 7, 463 feet. 
Fort Benton, 2,747 feet. 
Green River, 6,112 feet. 



Sherman, 8,235 feet. 



Omaha and Red River, 946 feet. 



ST. CLOUD AND BEYOND. ^ 49 

their tributaries, by the Mississippi, by the Eed 
Eiver, the Assinniboine, the Saskatchawan, and 
the Columbia, to be the abode, in the future, of 
uncounted millions of the human race. 

It is a solitude now, but the vanguard of the 
approaching multitude is near at hand. The 
farmer who lives up the stream and tends the ferry 
where w^e crossed yesterday has one neighbor with- 
in twelve miles ; but a twelvemonth hence these 
acres will have many farm-houses. To-day we 
have listened to a sermon by the Eev. Dr. Lord, 
who preached beneath a canvas roof. We were 
called together by the blowing of a tin trumpet, 
but a year hence the sweet and solemn tones of 
church-bells will in all probability echo over these 
verdant riieadows. 

The locomotive — that great civilizer of this 
century — will be here before the flowers bloom in 
the spring of 1871. It will bring towns, Adllages, 
churches, school-houses, printing-presses, and mil- 
lions of free people. I sit as in a dream. I can 
hear, in imagination, the voices of the advancing 
multitude, — of light-hearted maidens and sober 
matrons, of bright-eyed boys and strong-armed 
men. The wild roses are blooming here to-day, 
the sod is as yet unturned, and the lilies of the 
field hold up their cups to catch the falling dew ; 
but another year will bring the beginning of the 
change. Civilization, which has crossed the Mis- 

3 D 



50 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

sissippi, will soon flow down this stream, and sweep 
on to the valley of the Upper Missouri. 

Think of it, young men of the East, you w4io 
are measuring off tape for young ladies through 
the long and wearisome hours, barely earning your 
living ! Throw down the yardstick and come out 
here if you would be men. Let the fresh breeze 
fan your brow, take hold of the plough, bend down 
for a few years to hard work with determination 
to win nobility, and success will attend your efforts. 
Is this too enthusiastic ? Will those who read it 
say, "He has lost his head and gone daft out 
there on the prairies " ? I^ot quite. I am an ob- 
server here, as I have been in other lands. I have 
ridden many times over the great States of the 
ITorthwest ; have seen the riches of Santa Clai 
and Napa west of the Sierra ISTevadas ; have looked) 
out over the meadows of the Yanotse and the' 
Nile, and can say, with honest conviction, that I 
have seen nowhere so inviting a field as that of: 
Minnesota, none with greater undeveloped wealth,) 
or with such prospect of quick development. 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 61 



CHAPTEE III. 

THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 

MONDAY morning saw us on our way north- 
ward, — down the valley of the Eed Eiver. 

It was exhilarating to gallop over the level 
prairies, inhaling the fresh air, our horses brush- 
ing the dew from the grass, and to see flocks of 
plump prairie chickens rise in the air and whirr 
away, — to mark where they settled, and then to 
start them again and bring them down, one by one, 
with a double-barrelled shot-gun. Did w^e not think 
of the stews and roasts we would have at night ? 

For a dozen years or more every school-boy has 
seen upon his map the town of Breckenbridge, 
located on the Eed Eiver of the North. It is off 
from the traA^elled road. The town, as one of our 
teamsters informed us, " has gone up." It origi- 
nally consisted of two houses and a saw-mill, 
but the Sioux Indians swooped down upon it in 
1862, and burned the whole place. A few logs, 
the charred remains of timbers, and tall fire- weeds 
alone mark the spot. 

Eiding on, we readied Fort Abercrombie at noon. 
It is situated in Dakota, on the west bank of the 
Eed Eiver, which we crossed by a rope ferry. It 



52 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

is a resting-place for tlie thousands of teams pass- 
ing between St. Cloud and Fort Garry, and other 
X^laces in the far ISTorthwest. The place is of no 
particular account except as a distributing point 
for government supplies for forts farther on, and . 
the advancement of civilization will soon enable the 
AYar Department to break up the establishment. 

The river is fringed with timber. We ride 
beneath stately oaks growing upon the bottom- 
lands, and notice upon the trees the high-water 
marks of former years. The stream is very wind- 
ing, and when the sjoring rains come on the rise is 
as great, though not usually so rapid, as in the 
Merrimac and Connecticut, and other rivers of 
the East. 

The valley of the Eed Eiver is not such as we 
are accustomed to see in the East, bounded by 
hills or mountains, but a level plain. 

When the sky is clear and the air serene, we 
can catch far away in the east the faint outhne 
of the Leaf Hills, composing the low ridge between 
the Eed Eiver and the Mississippi, but westward 
there is nothing to bound the sight. The dead 
level reaches on and on to the rolling prairies of 
the Upper Missouri. 

The eye rests only upon the magnificent carpet, 
bright with wild roses and petunias, lilies and 
harebells, which Nature has unrolled upon the 
floor of this gorgeous palace. 



THE KED EIVER COUNTRY. 53 

I had been slow to believe all that had been told 
in regard to the genial climate of the Northwest, 
but through the courtesy of the commandant of the 
Fort, General Hunt, was permitted to see the me- 
teorological records kept at the post. 

The summer of 1868 was excessively warm in 
the "Western, Middle, and Atlantic States. Here, 
on one day in July, the mercury rose to ninety, 
degrees, Fahrenheit, but the mean temperature 
for the month was seventy-nine. In August the 
highest temperature was eighty-eight, the lowest 
fifty, the mean sixty-nine. In September the 
highest temperature was seventy-four, the mean 
forty-seven. A slight frost occurred on the night 
of the 16th, and a hard one on the last day of 
the month. In October a few flakes of snow 
fell on the 27th. In November there were a few 
inches of snow. Toward the close of December, 
on one day, the mercury reached twenty-seven 
below zero. On the 30th of January it dropped 
to thirty below. During this month there were 
four days on which snow fell, and in February 
there were ten snowy days. The greatest depth of 
snow during the winter was about eighteen inches, 
furnishing uninterrupted sleighing from December 
to March. 

On the 23d of March wild geese and ducks ap- 
peared, winging their way to Lake Winnipeg and 
Hudson Bay. The spring opened early in April. 



54 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

There are no farms as yet in the valley, — the 
few settlers cultivating only small patches of land. 

I have thought of this section of country as being 
almost up to the arctic circle, and can only disabuse 
my mind by comparing it with other localities in 
the same latitude. St. Paul is in the latitude of 
Bordeaux, in the grape-growing district of South- 
ern France. Here at Fort Abercrombie we are at 
least one hundred and fifty miles farther south 
than the world's gayest capital, Paris. 

It is not likely that Northern Minnesota will 
ever become a wine-producing coimtry, though wild 
grapes are found along the streams, and the people 
of St. Paul and Minneapolis will show us thrifty 
vines in their gardens, laden w^ith heavy clusters. 

Minnesota is a wheat-gTOwing region, climate 
and soil are alike favorable to its production. 

On the east bank of the Eed Eiver we see a 
field owned by Mr. ]\icAuley, who keeps a store 
and sells boots, pijoes, tobacco, powder, shot, and 
all kinds of supplies needed by hunters and fron- 
tiersmen. He sowed his wheat this year (1869) 
on the 5th of May, and it is now, on the 19th of 
July, heading out. "I had forty-five bushels to 
the acre last year," he says, " and the present crop 
will be equally good." 

This Eed Eiver Valley throughout its length 
and breadth is very fertile. Here are twenty thou- 
sand square miles of land, — an area as large as 



THE RED EIVER COUNTRY. 65 

Vermont and ]!^ew Hampshire combined, — unsur- 
passed for riclmess. 

The construction of the Northern Pacific Eail- 
road and the St. Paul and Pacific, both of which 
are to reach this valley within a few months, w^ill 
make these lands virtually as near market as the 
farms of Central or Western Illinois. From the 
Eed Kiver to Duluth the distance is 210 miles in 
a direct line. It is 187 miles from Chicago to 
Springfield, Illinois ; so that when the Northern 
Pacific Eaiboad is constructed to this point, Mr. 
McAuley will be just as near Boston or New York 
as the farmers who live in the vicinity of the capi- 
tal of Illinois ; for grain can be taken from Duluth 
to Buffalo, Oswego, or Ogdensburg as cheaply as 
from Chicago. The richness of the lands, the sup- 
ply of timber on the Eed Eiver and all its branch- 
es, with the opening of the two lines of railway, 
will give a rapid settlement to this paradise of the 
Northwest. 

Professor Hind, of Toronto, who was sent out by 
the Canadian government to explore the British 
Possessions northwest of Lake Superior, in his re- 
port says : " Of the valley of the Eed Eiver I find 
it impossible to speak in any other terms than 
those which may express astonishment and admi- 
ration. I entirely concur in the brief but expres- 
sive description given me by an English settler on 
the Assinniboine, that the valley of the Eed Eiver, 



66 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

including a large portion belonging to its great af- 
fluents, is a paradise of fertility." 

In Mr. INIcAuley's garden we see corn in tlie 
spindle. The broad leaves wear as rich a green as 
if fertilized with the best Peruvian guano ; and no 
wonder, for the soil is a deep black loam, and as 
mellow as an ash-heap. His peas were sown the 
2d of June, and they are already large enough 
for the table ! He will have an abundant supply 
of cucumbers by the first of August. They were 
not started under glass, but the dry seeds were 
dropped in the hills the same day he planted his 
peas, — the 2d of June. 

Vegetation advances with great rapidity. Mr. 
McAuley says that vegetables and grains come 
to maturity ten or fifteen days earlier here than at 
Manchester, New Hampshire, where he once re- 
sided. 

General Pope was formerly stationed at Fort 
Abercrombie ; and in Ms report upon the resources 
of the country and its climatology, says that the 
wheat, upon an average, is five pounds per bushel 
heavier than that grown in Illinois or the Middle 
States. 

We saw yesterday a gentleman and lady who 
live at Fort Garry, and who call themselves " Win- 
nipeggers." They were born in Scotland, and had 
been home to Old Scotia to see their friends. 

" How do you like Winnipeg ? " I asked. 



THE EED EIVER COUNTRY. 



67 



" There is no finer country in tlie world," he 
replied. 

" Do you not have cold winters ? " 

" Not remarkably so. We have a few cold days, 
but the air is usually clear and still on such days, 
and we do not mind the cold. If we only had a 
railroad, it would be the finest j)lace in the world 
to live in." 

We wonder at his enthusiasm over a country 
which we have thought of as being almost, if not 
quite, out of the world, while he doubtless looks 
with pity upon us who are content to remain in 
such a cooped-up place as the East. 

Most of us, unless we have become nomads, 
think that there are no garden patches so attrac- 
tive as our own, and we wonder how other people 
can be willing to live so far off. 

This Winnipeg gentleman says that the winters 
are no more severe at Fort Garry than at St. Paul, 
and that the spring opens quite as early. 

The temperature for the year at Fort Garry is 
much like that of Montreal, as will be seen by the 
following comparison : — 





Spring. 


Summer. 


Autumn. 


Winter. 


Montreal, 
Port Garry, 


43° 
36 


o 

70 

68 


o 

49 

48 


o 

17 

7 



3* 



58 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

This shows the mean temperatures for the three 
months of each season. Though the mercury is 
ten degrees lower at Fort Garry in the winter than 
at Montreal, there is less wind, fewer raw days, 
much less snow, and, taken all in all, the climate is 
more aoTceable. 

Bidding good by to the courteous commander of 
the fort, who supplies that portion of our party 
going to the Missouri with an escort, we gallop on 
through this " Paradise," starting flocks of plovers 
from the waving grass, and bringing down, now 
and then, a prairie chicken. 

Far away, on the verge of the horizon, we can 
see our w^agons, — mere specks. 

Wliat a place for building a railway ! Not a 
hillock nor a hollow, not a curve or loss of gra- 
dient ; timber enough on the river for ties. And 
when built, what a place to let on steam ! The 
engineer may draw his throttle-valve and give the 
piston full head. Here will be the place to see 
what iron, steel, and steam can do. 

We pitch our tents for the night in the suburbs 
of Burlington, not far from the hotel and post- 
oSice. The hotel, which just now is the only 
building in town, is built of logs. It is not very 
spacious inside, but it has all the universe out- 
side ! 

Once a week the mail-carrier passes from Fort 
Abercrombie to Pembina, and as there are a half- 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 59 

dozen pioneers and lialf-breeds within a radius of 
thirty miles of Burlington, a post-office has been 
established here, which is kept in a shed adjoining 
the hotel. 

The postmaster gives us a cordial greeting. It 
is a pleasure to hear this blaff but wide-awake 
German say, " 0, I have been acquainted with 
you for a long while. I followed you through the 
war and around the world." 

From first to last, in letters from the battle-field, 
from the various countries of the world, and in 
these notes of travel, it has ever been my aim to 
write for the comprehension of the people ; and 
such spontaneous and uncalled-for commendation 
of my efforts out here upon the prairies was more 
gTateful than many a w^ell-meant paragraph from 
the public press. 

While pitching our tents, a flock of pigeons flew 
past, and down in the woods along the bank of 
the river we could hear their cooing. Those who 
had shot-ojuns went to the hunt ; while some of 
us tried the river for fish, but returned luckless. 
The supper was good enough, however, without 
trout or pickerel. Who can ask for anything 
better than prairie chicken, plover, duck, pork, 
and pigeons ? 

Then, when hunger is appeased, w^e sit around 
the camp-fire and think of the future of this para- 
dise. Near by is another camp-fire. 



60 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

I see by its glimmering light a stalwart man 
with shaggy beard and a slouched hat. The emi- 
grant's wife sits on the other side of the fire, and 
by its light I see that she wears a faded linsey- 
woolsey dress, that her hair is uncombed, and that 
she has not given much attention to her toilet. 
Two frowzy-headed children, a boy and a girl, are 
romping in the grass. The w^orldly effects of this 
family are in that canvas-covered ox-wagon, with 
a chicken-coop at the hinder part, and a tin kettle 
dangling beneath the axle. This emigrant has 
come from Iowa. He is moving into this valley 
" to take up a claim." That is, he is going to se- 
lect a piece of choice land under the Homestead 
Act, build a cabin, and " make a l)reak in the per- 
ra-ry," he says. 

He will be followed by others. The tide is 
setting in rapidly, and by the time the railway 
company are ready to carry freight there will be 
population enough here to support the road. 

We have an early start in the morning. Our 
route is along a highway, upon which there is more 
travel than upon many of the old turnpikes of 
New England for Winnipeg, and the Hudson Bay 
posts receive all their supplies over this road. 

At our noonday halt we fall in with Father 
Genin, a French Catholic priest, who lives on the 
bank of the river in a log-hut. He comes out to 
see us, wearing a long black bombazine priestly 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 61 

gown, and low-crowned hat. He is in the prime 
of life, was educated at Paris, came to Quebec, and 
is assigned to the Northwest. He has sailed over 
Lake Winnipeg, and paddled his canoe on the Sas- 
katchawan and Athabasca. 

"My parish," he says, "reaches from St. Paul to 
the Eocky Mountains." He speaks in glowing 
terms of the country up " in the ISTorthwest," — as 
if we, who are now sixteen hundred miles from 
Boston, had not reached the Northwest ! 

Our talk with Father Genin, and his enthusias- 
tic description of the Saskatchawan Valley, has 
set us to thinking of this region, to which the 
United States once held claim, and which might 
now have been a part of our domain if it had not 
been for the pusillanimity of President Polk. 

Mackenzie was the first European who gave to 
the world an account of the coimtry lying between 
lis and the Arctic Sea. He was in this valley in 
1789, and was charmed with it. He made his 
way down to Lake Winnipeg, thence up the Sas- 
katchawan to Athabasca Lake. At the carrying- 
place between the Saskatchawan and Athabasca 
rivers, at Portage la Loche, he discovered springs 
of petroleum, which are thus described : — 

" Twenty-five miles from the fork are some 
bituminous springs, into which a pole may be 
inserted without the least resistance. The bitumen 
is in a fluid state, and when mixed with resin is 



62 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 



used to gum the canoes. In its heated state it 
emits a smell like sea-coal. The banks of Slave 
Eiver, which are elevated, discover veins of the 
same bituminous quahty." * 

His winter quarters were near Lake Athabasca, 
at Fort Chippewayan, more than thirteen hundred 
miles northwest from Chicago. He thus writes in 
regard to the country : — 

" In the fall of 1787, when I first arrived at 
Athabasca, Mr. Pond was settled on the bank of the 
Elk Eiver, where he remained three years, and had 
as fine a kitchen-garden as I ever saw in Canada " 
(p. 127). 

Of the climate in winter he says that the be- 
ginning was cold, and about one foot of snow fell. 
The last week in December and the first week in 
January were marked by warm southwest breezes, 
which dissolved all the snow. Wild geese ap- 
peared on the 13th of March ; and on the 5th of 
April the snow had entirely disappeared. On the 
20th he wrote : — 

" The trees are budding, and many plants are in 
blossom" (p. 150). 

Mackenzie left the " Old Establishment," as one 
of the posts of the Hudson Bay Company was 
called, on the Peace Eiver, in the month of May, 
for the Eocky INIountains. He followed the stream 
through the gap of the mountains, passed to the 

* General History of the Fur-Trade, p. 87. 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 63 

head-waters of Eraser Eiver, and descended that 
stream to the Pacific. He thus describes the coun- 
try along the Peace Eiver : — 

" This magnificent theatre of nature has all the 
decorations which the trees and animals can afford 
it. Groves of poplars in every shape vary the 
scene, and their intervales are reheved with vast 
herds of elk and buffaloes, — the former choosing 
the steeps and uplands, the latter preferring the 
plains. The whole country displayed an exube- 
rant verdure; the trees that bear blossoms were 
advancing fast to that delightful appearance, and 
the velvet rind of tlieir branches reflecting the 
oblique rays of a rising or setting sun added a 
splendid gayety to the scene which no expressions 
of mine are qualified to describe" (p. 154). 

This was in latitude 55° 17', about fourteen hun- 
dred miles from St. Paul. 

The next traveller who enlightened the world 
upon this region was Mr. Harman, a native of Yer- 
gennes, Vermont, who became connected with the 
Northwest Fur Company, and passed seventeen 
years in British America. He reached Lake Win- 
nipeg in 1800, and his first winter was passed 
west of the lake. Under date of January 5th we 
have this record in his journal : — 

" Beautiful weather. Saw in different herds at 
least a thousand buffaloes grazing " (p. 68). 

" February 17th. — We have now about a foot 



64 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

and a half of snow on the ground. This morning 
one of our people killed a buffalo on the prairie 
opposite the fort " (p. 73). 

" March 14:th. — The greater part of the snow is 
dissolved." * 

On the 6th of A]3ril Mr. Harman ^YTites : " I 
have taken a ride on horseback to a place where 
our people are making sugar. My path led me 
over a small prairie, and through a wood, where I 
saw a great variety of birds that were straining 
their tuneful throats as if to welcome the return 
of another spring ; small animals were running 
about, or skipping from tree to tree, and at the 
same time were to be seen, swans, bustards, ducks, 
etc. swimming about in the rivers and ponds. All 
these things together rendered my ramble beautiful 
beyond description " (p. 75). 

During the month of April there were two 
snow-storms, but the snow disappeared nearly as 
fast as it fell. 

One winter was passed by Mr. Harman in the 
country beyond Lake Athabasca, on the Athabasca 
Eiver, where he says the snow during the winter 
"was at no time more than two feet and a half 
deep " (p. 174). 

* On the 16tli of March, 1870, while these notes were under 
review, the streets of Boston were deep with snow, and twenty- 
four trains were blockaded on the Boston and Albany Raili'oad 
between Springfield and Albany. 



THE BED RIVER COUNTRY. bo 

On May 6tli he writes : " We have planted onr po- 
tatoes and sowed most of onr garden-seeds " (p. 178). 

" June 2cl. — The seeds which we sowed in the 
garden have sprung up and grown remarkably 
weU. The present prospect is that strawberries, 
red raspberries, shad-berries, cherries, etc. will be 
abundant this season." 

" July 21st. — We have cut down our barley, 
and I think it is the finest that I ever saw in any 
country. The soil on the points of land along 
this river is excellent" (p. 181). 

" October 3d. — We have taken our potatoes out 
of the ground, and find that nine bushels which 
we planted on the 10th of May last have produced 
a little more than one hundred and fifty bushels. 
The other vegetables in our garden have yielded 
an increase much in the same proportion, which is 
suf&cient proof that the soil of the points of land 
along this river is good. Indeed, I am of opinion 
that wheat, rye, barley, oats, peas, etc. would grow 
well in the plains around us " (p. 186). 

He passed several winters at the head-waters of 
Peace Eiver, in the Eocky Mountains. In his 
journal Ave have these records : — 

" 3fay 7th. — The weather is -very fine, and vege- 
tation is far advanced for the season. Swans and 
ducks are numerous in the lakes and rivers." 

" May 22cl — Planted potatoes and sowed gar- 
den-seeds." 



66 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

" October Zd. — We have taken our vegetables 
out of the ground. We have forty-one bushels of 
potatoes, the produce of one bushel planted last 
spring. Our turnips, barley, etc. have produced 
well" (p. 257). 

In 1814 he writes under date of September 
3d : "A few days since we cut down our barley. 
The five quarts which I sowed on the 1st of May 
have yielded as many bushels. One acre of 
ground, producing in the same proportion, would 
yield eighty-four bushels. This is sufficient proof 
that the soil in many places in this quarter is 
favorable to agriculture " (p. 267). 

Sir John Eichardson, who explored the arctic 
regions by this route, says : '' Wheat is raised 
with profit at Fort Liard, lat. 60° 5' N., Ion. 122° 
31' W., and four or five hundred feet above the sea. 
This locahty, however, being in the vicinity of the 
Eocky Mountains, is subject to summer frosts, and 
the grain does not ripen every year, though in 
favorable seasons it gives a good return." 

In 1857, Captain Palliser, of the Eoyal Engi- 
neers, was sent out by the English government 
to explore the region between Lake Superior and 
the Pacific, looking towards the construction of a 
railroad across the continent, througli the British 
Possessions. His report to the government is 
published in the Blue-Book. 

Speaking of the country along the Assinniboine, 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 67 

he says : " The Assinniboine has a course of nearly 
three hundred miles ; lies wholly within a fertile 
and partially wooded country. The lower part of 
the valley for seventy miles, before it joins the 
Eed Eiver, affords land of surpassing richness and 
fertility " (p. 9). 

Of the South Saskatchawan, he says that "it 
flows through a thick- wooded country" (p. 10). 

The natural features of the north branch of that 
river are set forth in glowing language : — 

" The richness of the natural pasture in many 
places on the North Saskatchawan and its trib- 
utary, Battle Eiver, can hardly be exaggerated. 
Its value does not consist in its long rank grasses 
or in its great quantity, but from its fine quality, 
comprising nutritious species of grasses, along with 
natural vetches in great variety, which remain 
throughout the winter juicy and fit for the nour- 
ishment of stock. 

" Almost anywhere along the Saskatchawan a 
sufficiency of good soil is everywhere to be found, 
fit for all purposes, both for pasture and tillage, 
extending towards the thick- wooded hills, and also 
to be found in the region of the lakes, between 
Forts Pitt and Edmonton. In almost every direc- 
tion around Edmonton the land is fine, excepting 
only the hilly country at the higher level, such as 
the Beacon Hills ; even there there is nothing 
like sterility, only the surface is too much broken 



68 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

to be occupied while more level country can be 
obtained" (p. 10). 

Going up tbe Saskatcliawan lie discovered beds 
of coal, wliicb are thus described : — 

" In the upper part of the Saskatcliawan country, 
coal of fine quahty occurs abundantly, and may 
hereafter be very useful. It is quite fit to be em- 
ployed in the smelting of iron from the ore of that 
metal, which occurs in large quantities in the same 
strata " (p. 11). 

Two hundred miles north of this coal deposit, 
Mackenzie discovered the springs of petroleum and 
coal strata along the banks of the streams. Har- 
man saw the same. 

PaUiser wintered on the Saskatchawan, and 
speaks thus of the climate: — 

"The climate in winter is more rigorous than 
that of Eed Eiver, and partial thaws occur long 
before the actual oj)eniiig of spring. The winter 
is much the same in duration, but the amount of 
snow that falls rapidly decreases as we approach 
the mountains. The river generally freezes about 
the 12 til of November, and breaks up from the 
17th to the 20th of April. During the winter 
season of five months the means of travelling and 
transport are greatly facilitated by the snow, the 
ordinary depth of which is sufficient for the use 
of sleighs, without at the same time being great 
enough to impede horses. 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 69 

" The whole of this region of country would be 
valuable, not only for agriculture, but also for 
mixed purposes of settlement. The whole region 
is well wooded and watered, and enjoys a climate 
far preferable to that of either Sweden or Norway. 
I have not only seen excellent wheat, but Indian 
corn (wliich will not succeed in England or Ire- 
land), ripening on Mr. Pratt's farm at the Qui 
Appelle Lakes in 1857" (p. 11). 

Father De Smet, a Catholic missionary, in 1845 
crossed the Eocky Mountains from British Colum- 
bia, eastward to the head-waters of the south 
branch of the Saskatchawan, and passed along the ' 
eastern base of the mountains to Edmonton. He 
characterizes the country as " an ocean of prairies." 

" The entire region," he says, "in the vicinity of 
the eastern chain of the Eocky Mountains, serving 
as their base for thirty or sixty miles, is extremely 
fertile, abounding in forests, plains, prairies, lakes, 
streams, and mineral springs. The rivers and 
streams are innumerable, and on every side offer 
situations favorable for the construction of mills. 
The northern and southern branches of the Sas- 
katchawan water the district I have traversed for 
a distance of about three hundred miles. Forests 
of pines, cypress, cedars, poplar and aspen trees, 
as well as others of different kinds, occupy a large 
portion of it. The country would be capable of 
supporting a large population, and the soil is favor- 



70 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

able for the production of wheat, barley, potatoes, 
and beans, which grow here as well as in the more 
southern countries." 

It is a region abundantly supplied with coal of 
the lignite formation. Father Genin has a speci- 
men of lignite taken from the banks of Maple 
Eiver, about seven miles from our camp. It is a 
small branch of the Eed Eiver flowing from the 
west. If we were to travel northwest a little more 
than one hundred miles, we should come to the 
Little Souris or Mouse Eiver, a branch of the As- 
sinniboine, where we should iind seams of the same 
kind of coal. Continuing on to the Saskatchawan, 
we shall find it appearing all along the river from 
Fort Edmonton to the Eocky Mountains, a distance 
of between three and four hundred miles. 

Dr. Hector, geologist to the exploring expedition 
under Captain Palhser, thus describes the coal on 
Eed Deer Eiver, a branch of the South Saskatcha- 
wan : — 

" The lignite forms beds of great thickness, one 
group of seams measuring twenty-five feet in thick- 
ness, of which twelve feet consist of pure compact 
lignite. At one point the seam was on fire, and the 
Indians say that for as long as they can remember 
the fire at this place has not been extinguished, 
summer or winter" (p. 233). 

Father De Smet passed down the river in 1845, 
and it was then on fire. If we were to travel 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 71 

nortll^yard from the Eed Deer to the Peace Elver, 
we should find the same formation; and If we were 
to glide down the Mackenzie towards the Arctic 
Sea, we should, according to the intrepid voyager 
whose name it bears, find seams of coal along its 
banks. 

i\Ir. Bourgeau, botanist to the Palliser Exploring 
Expedition, in a letter addressed to Sir William 
Hooker, has the following remarks upon the capa- 
bilities of the Northwest for supporting a dense 
population : — 

" It remains for me to call the attention of the 
English government to the advantages there would 
be in establishing agricultural districts in the vast 
plains of Eupert's Land, and particularly in the 
Saskatchawan, in the neighborhood of Fort Carl- 
ton. This district is much better adapted to the 
culture of staple crops than one would have been 
inclined to believe from this high latitude. In ef- 
fect, the few attempts at the culture of cereals 
already made in the vicinity of the Hudson Bay 
Company's posts demonstrate by their success how 
easy it would be to obtain products sufficiently 
large to remunerate the efforts of the agricultur- 
ist. Then, in order to put the land under cultiva- 
tion, it would be necessary only to till the better 
portions of the soil. The prairies offer natural 
pasturage as favorable for the maintenance of nu- 
merous herds as if they had been artificially ere- 



72 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

ated. The construction of houses for habitation 
and for pioneer development would involve but 
little expense, because in many parts of the coun- 
try, independent of wood, one would find fitting 
stones for building purposes, and it is easy to find 

clay for bricks The vetches found here are 

as fitting for nourishment of cattle as the clover of 
European pasturage. The abundance of buffaloes, 
and the facility with which herds of horses and 
oxen increase, demonstrate that it would be enough 
to shelter animals in winter, and to feed them 

in the shelters with hay In the gardens of 

the Hudson Bay Company's posts, beans, peas, 
and French beans have been successfully culti- 
vated; also cabbages, turnips, carrots, rhubarb, and 
currants " (p. 250). 

The winters of the Northwest are wholly unlike 
those of the Eastern and Middle States. The 
meteorologist of Palliser's Expedition says : " Along 
the eastern base of the Eocky Mountains there is 
a narrow strip of country in which there is never 
more than a few inches of snow on the ground. 
About forty miles to the eastward, however, the 
fall begins to be much greater, but during the win- 
ter rarely exceeds two feet. On the prairies the 
snow evaporates rapidly, and, except in hollows 
where it is drifted, never accumulates ; but in the 
woods it is protected, and in spring is often from 
tliree to four feet deep" (p. 268). 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 73 

Captain Palliser and party travelled from post 
to post during the winter without difficulty. In 
February, 1859, he travelled from Edmonton to 
Lake St. Ann's. On two nights the mercury was 
frozen in the bulb, — as it is not unfrequently at 
Franconia, New Hampsliire. Exclusive of those 
two cold nights, the mean of the temperature was 
seventeen. He says : " This was a trip made dur- 
ing the coldest weather experienced in the country. 
If proper precautions are taken, there is nothing 
merely in extreme cold to stop travelling in the 
wooded country, but the danger of freezing from 
exposure upon the open plains is so great that they 
cannot be ventured on with safety during any part 
of the winter" (p. 268). 

The Wesleyan Missionary Society of England 
has a mission at Edmonton, under the care of 
Eev. Thomas Woolsey. The following extracts 
from his journal mil show the jirogress of the 
winter and spring season in 1855 : — 

" Nov. 1. A little snow has fallen for the first time. 

" 1 2. Swamps frozen over. 

" 13. A little more snow. 

" 17. Crossed river on the ice. 

Dec. 2. The past week has been remarkably mild. 

" 9. More snow. 
1856. Jan. 8 to 11. More like spring than winter. 

Jan. 13. Fine open weather. 

" 17. Somewhat colder. 

4 



74 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Feb. 14. Weather open. 

" 16. Snow rapidly disappearing. 

Mar. 11. More snow. 

" 17. Firing pasture-grounds to-day. 

" 18. Thunder-storm. 

" 21. Ducks and geese returning. 

" 30. More snow, but it is rapidly disappearing. 

" 31. Snow quite gone. 

April 7. Ploughing commenced. 

" 28. First wheat sown." 

The succeeding winter was more severe, and 
three feet of snow fell during the season, but the 
spring opened quite as early as in 1856. The 
comparative mildness of the winter climate of all 
this vast area of the West and Northwest, at the 
head-waters of the Missouri, and in the British 
dominions, as far north as latitude 70°, is in a great 
measure due to the warm winds of the Pacific. 

In the autumn of 1868 I crossed the Pacific, 
from Japan to San Francisco, in the Pacific mail- 
steamer Colorado. Soon after leaving the Bay of 
Yokohama we entered the Kuro-SiAvo, or the Black 
Ocean Eiver of the Asiatic coast. This ocean cur- 
rent bears a remarkable resemblance to the Gulf 
Stream of the Atlantic. Along the eastern shore 
of Japan the water, like that along Virginia and 
the Carolinas, is very cold, but we sudcfenly pass 
into the heated river, which, starting from the 
vicinity of the Philippine Islands, laves the east- 



THE RED RIVER COUNTRY. 75 

ern shore of Formosa, and rushes past the Bay of 
Yeddo at the rate of eighty miles per day. This 
heated river strikes across the ISTorthern Pacific to 
British Columbia and Puget Sound, giving a genial 
climate nearly up to the Arctic Circle. No icebergs 
are ever encountered in the North Pacific. The 
influence of the Kuro-Siwo upon the Northwest is 
very much like that which the Gulf Stream has 
upon England and Norway. It gives to Oregon, 
Washington, British Columbia, and Vancouver Isl- 
and winters so mild that the people cannot lay in 
a supply of ice for the summer. Eoses bloom in 
the gardens throughout the year. So the water 
heated beneath the tropics, off the eastern coast of 
Siam and north of Borneo, flows along the shore 
of Japan up to the Aleutian Isles, imparting its 
heat to the air, which, under the universal law, 
ascends when heated, and sweeps over the Eocky 
Mountains, and tempers the climate east of them 
almost to Hudson Bay. 

So wonderfully arranged is this mighty machin- 
ery of nature, that millions of the human race in 
coming years will rear their habitations and enjoy 
the blessino's of civilization in regions that other- 
wise would be pathless solitudes. 

In the meteorological register kept at Carlton 
House, in lat. 52° 51', on the eastern limit of the 
Saskatchawan Plain, eleven hundred feet above the 
sea, we find this entry : " At this place westerly 



76 



THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 



winds bring mild weather, and the easterly ones 
are attended by fog and snow." 

By the following tabular statement we see at a 
glance the snow-fall at various places in the United 
States. We give average depths for the winter as 
set down in Blodget's climatology. 



Oxford County, Maine 


. 90 inches. 


Dover, New Hampshire 


68 


Montreal, Canada . 


. 66 


Burlington, Vermont . 


85 


Worcester, Massachusetts 


. 55 


Cincinnati, Ohio . 


19 


Burlington, Iowa 


. 15 « 


Beloit, Wisconsin 


25 « 


Fort Abercrombie, Dakota 


. 12 " 



From this testimony I am impelled to believe 
that the immense area west of Lake Superior and 
south of the 60th parallel is as capable of being 
settled as those portions of Eussia, Sweden, and 
Norway south of that degree, now swarming with 
people. That parallel passes through St. Peters- 
burg, Stockholm, Christiania, and the Shetland 
Isles on the eastern hemisj)here. Fort Liard and 
Central Alaska on the western. 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 77 

CHAPTEE IV. 

THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 

HUNDEEDS of Winnipeggers were upon the 
road, either going to or retTirning from St. 
Cloud, from whence all groceries and other sup- 
plies are obtained. The teams consist of a single 
horse or ox, not unfrequently a cow, harnessed to 
a two-wheeled cart. The outfit is a curiosity. The 
wheels are six or seven feet in diameter, and very 
dishing. A small rack is affixed to the w^ooden 
axle. The concern is composed wholly of wood, 
with a few raw-hide thongs. It is primitive in 
design and construction, and though so rude, though 
there is not an ounce of iron about the cart, it 
serves the purpose of these voyagers admirably. 
Our teams have been stuck in the mud, at the 
crossings of creeks, half a dozen times a day ; but 
those high- wheeled carts are borne up by the grass 
roots where ours go down to the hub. 

There is a family to each cart, — father, mother, 
and a troop of frowzy-headed, brown-faced chil- 
dren, who, though shoeless and hatless and half 
naked, are as happy as the larks singing in the 
meadows, or the plover skimming the air on quiv- 
They travel in companies, — fifteen 



78 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

or twenty carts in a caravan. When night comes 
on, the animals are turned out to graze ; the fami- 
lies cook each their own scanty supply of food, 
smoke their pipes by the glimmering camp-fire, 
tell their stories of adventure among the buffaloes, 
roll themselves in a blanket, creep beneath their 
carts, — all the family in a pile if the night is cool, 
— sleep soundly, and are astir before daylight, and 
on the move by sunrise. The journey down and 
back is between eight and nine hundred miles ; and 
as the average distance travelled is only about 
twenty miles a day, it takes from forty to fifty 
days to make the round trip. JSTo wonder the 
people of that settlement are anxious to have a 
railroad reach the Eed Eiver. 

Leaving the Pembina road and striking west- 
ward to the river, we descend the bank to the 
bottom-land, which is usually about twenty-five 
feet below the general surface of the valley. We 
cross the river by a roi)e ferry kept by a half-breed, 
and strike out upon the Dakota plain. The trail 
that we are upon bears northwest, and is the main 
road to Fort Totten, near Lake Miniwakan, or the 
" Devil's Lake," and the forts on the Upper Mis- 
souri. Here, as upon the Minnesota side, the wild- 
flowers are blooming in luxuriance. Our horses 
remorselessly trample the roses, the convolvulus, 
and the lilies beneath their feet. 

The prairie chickens are whirring in every direc- 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 79 

tion, and one of onr bluff and burly teamsters, who 
is at home upon the prairies, who in the First Min- 
nesota Eegiment faced the Eebels in all the battles 
of the Peninsula, who was in the thickest of the 
fight at Gettysburg, who has hunted Indians over 
the Upper Missouri region, who is as keen-sighted 
as a hawk, takes the grouse right and left as 
they rise. His slouched hat bobs up and down 
everywhere. He seems to know just where the 
game is ; now he is at your right hand, now upon 
the run a half-mile away upon the prairies. He 
stops, raises his gun, — there is a puff of smoke, 
another, and he has two more chickens in his ba^r. 
We are sure of having good suppers as long as he 
is about. 

We reach Dakota City, — another thriving town 
of one log-house, — peopled by Monsieur Marchaud, 
a French Canadian, his Chippewa wife and twelve 
children. 

While our tents are being pitched, we cross the 
river by another ferry to Georgetown, — a place 
consisting of two dwellings and a large storehouse 
owned by the Hudson Bay Company. This is the 
present steamboat landing, though sometimes the 
one steamer now on the river goes ujd to Fort 
Abercrombie. The river is narrow and winding 
south of this point, and not well adapted to navi- 
gation. 

We find an obliging young Scotchman with a 



80 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

thin-faced wife in possession of the property be- 
longing to the Company. He takes care of the 
premises through the year on a salary of two hun- 
dred dollars, and has his tea, sugar, and groceries 
furnished him. He can cultivate as much land as 
he pleases, though he does not own a foot of it, — 
neither does the Company own an acre. It belongs 
to the people of the United States, and any brave 
young man with a large-hearted wife may become 
possessor of these beautiful acres if lie will, with 
the moral certainty of finding them quadrupled in 
value in five years. 

This great highway of the ISTorth lies along the 
eastern bank of the river. We have travelled over 
it all the way from Fort Abercrombie, passing and 
meeting teams. Here we see a train of thirty 
wagons drawn by oxen, loaded with goods consist- 
ing of boxes of tea, sugar, salt, pork, bacon, and 
bales of cloth, which are shipped by steamer from 
this landing. The teas come from England to 
Montreal, are there shipped to Llilwaukie, and 
transported by rail to St. Cloud. Each chest is 
closely packed in canvas and taken through in 
bond. The transportation of the Hudson Bay Com- 
pany between this place and St. Cloud amounts to 
about seven hundred tons per annum. 

In addition, the Eed Eiver transportation car- 
ried on by the Indians and half-breeds is very 
large. About twenty-five hundred carts pass down 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 81 

and up this highway during the year, each one 
carrying upon an average nine hundred pounds. 

Besides all this there is the United States gov- 
ernment transportation to Port Abercrombie and 
the forts beyond, amounting last year to eighteen 
hundred tons. The rates paid by the War Depart- 
ment government for transportation are $ 1.36 f per 
hundred pounds for every hundred miles. All of 
this traffic will be transferred at once to the North- 
ern Pacific Eailroad upon its completion to the Eed 
Eiver. 

The estimated value of the Eed Eiver trade is 
ten millions of dollars per annum, and it is in- 
creasing every year. 

The keen-eyed hunters of our party have been 
on the lookout for a stray buffalo or a deer, but 
the buffaloes are a hundred miles away. We hear 
that they have come north of the Missouri in great 
numbers, and those who are to go West antici- 
pate rare sport. For want of a buffalo-steak we 
put up with beef. It is juicy and tender, from one 
of Mr. Marchaud's heifers, which has been pur- 
chased for the party. 

It is a supper fit for sovereigns, — and every one 
is a sovereign out here, on the unsurveyed lands, 
of which we, in common with the rest of the peo- 
ple, are proprietors. We are lords of the manor, 
and we have sat down to a feast. Our eggs are 
newly laid by the hens of Dakota City, our milk 

4* F 



82 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

is fresh from the cows whose bells are tinkling in 
the bushes along the bank of the river, and the 
cakes upon onr table are of the finest flour in 
the world. Hunger furnishes the best relish, and 
when the cloth is removed we sit around the 
camp-fire during the evening, passing away the 
hours with wit, repartee, and jest, mingled with 
sober argument and high intellectual thought. 

Our tents are pitched upon the river's bank. 
Far away to the south we trace the dim outline 
of the timber on the streams flowing in from the 
west. Turning our eyes in that direction, we see 
only the level sea of verdure, — the green grass 
waving in the evening breeze. At this place our 
company will divide, — Governor Marshall, Mr. 
Holmes, and several other gentlemen, going on to 
the Missouri, while the rest of us will travel east- 
ward to Lake Superior. 

It would be a pleasure to go with them, — to 
ride over the rolling prairies, to fall in wdth 
buffaloes and try my pony in a race with a big 
bull. It would be thrilling, — only if the hunted 
should right about face, and toss the hunter on his 
horns, the thriU. would be of a different sort ! 

We sit by our camp-fires at night wath our faces 
and hands smeared with an abominable mixture 
prepared by our M. D., ostensibly to keep the mos- 
quitoes from presenting their bills, but which we 
surmise is a little game of his to daub us with a 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 83 

diabolical mixture of glycerine, soap, and tar ! 
Our tents are as odorous as the shop of a keeper 
of naval stores. There is an all-pervading smell 
of oakum and turpentine. Clouds of mosquitoes 
come, take a whiff, and retire in disgust. We can 
hear them having a big swear at the Doctor for 
compounding such an ointment ! 

I think of the country which those who are 
going west will see, and of the region beyond, — the 
valley of the Yellowstone, the JNIissouri, the slopes 
of the Eocky ^Mountains, and the hills of Montana, 
— territory to be included in the future Empire 
of the Northwest. I have ^vritten the word, but 
it bears no political meaning in these notes. It 
has the same signification as when applied to the 
State of New York. The Empire of the North- 
west will be the territory lying north of the cen- 
tral ridge of the continent. Milwaukie may be 
taken as a starting-point for a survey of this im- 
perial domain. That city is near the 43d parallel ; 
following it westward, we see that it passes over 
the mountain-range on whose northern slopes the 
southern affluents of the Yellowstone take their 
rise. All the fertile valleys of the Columbia and 
its tributaries lie north of this parallel; all the 
streams of the Upper Missouri country, and the 
magnificent water-system of Puget Sound, and the 
intricate bays and inlets of British Columbia, 
reaching on to Alaska, having their only counter- 



84 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

part in the fiords of JSTorway, are north of that 
degree of latitude. I liave abeady taken a view 
of the region now comprised in the British do- 
minions east of the Eocky Mountains ; but equally 
interesting will be a re^dew of the territories of the 
Eepublic, — Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Oregon, and 
Washington, also British Columbia and Vancouver. 

Dakota contains a little more than a hundred 
and fifty thousand square miles, — nearly enough 
territory to make four States as large as Ohio. 

" The climate and soil of Dakota," says the 
Commissioner of PubHc Lands, General Wilson, in 
his Eeport for 1869, "are exceedingly favorable to 
the growth of wheat, corn, and other cereals, while 
all the fruits raised in the N'orthern States are 

here produced in the greatest perfection 

The wheat crop varied from twenty to forty bush- 
els to the acre. Oats have produced from fifty to 
seventy bushels to the acre, and are of excellent 
quahty" (p. 144). 

Settlements are rapidly extending up the Mis- 
souri, and another year will behold this northern 
section teeming with emigrants. The northern 
section of the territory is bare of wood, but the 
southern portion is well supplied with timber in 
the Black HiUs. 

Two thousand square miles of the region of the 
Black Hills, says Professor Hayden, geologist to 
the United States Exploring Expedition under 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 85 

General Eeynolds, is covered with excellent pine 
timber. That is an area half as large as the State 
of Connecticut, ample for the southern section ; 
while the settlers of the northern portion will be 
within easy distance by rail of the timbered lands 
of Minnesota. 

The northern half of Wyoming is north of the 
line we have drawn from Milwaukie to the Pa- 
cific, and of this Territory the Land Commissioner 
says : " A large portion of Wyoming produces a 
luxuriant growth of short nutritious grass, upon 
wliich cattle will feed and fatten during summer 
and winter without other provender. Those lands, 
even in their present condition, are superior for 
grazing. The climate is mild and healthy, the air 
and water pure, and springs abundant" (p. 159). 

Beyond the 104th meridian lies Montana, a lit- 
tle larger than Dakota, with area enough for four 
States of the size of Ohio. 

At St. Paul I was fortunate enough to fall in 
with Major-General Hancock, who had just re- 
turned from Montana, and who was enthusiastic in 
its praise. 

" I consider it," he said, " to be one of the first 
grazing countries in the world. Its valleys are 
exceedingly fertile. It is capable of sustaining a 
dense population." 

Wheat grows as luxuriantly in the valleys at 
the base of the Eocky Mountains as in Minnesota. 



S6 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

The Territory appears to be richer in minerals than 
any other section of the country, the gold product 
surpassing that of any other State or Territory. 
More than one hundred million dollars have been 
taken from the mines of Montana since the discov- 
ery of gold in this territory in 1862. Coal appears 
ujDon the Yellowstone in veins ten, fifteen, and 
twenty feet in thickness. It is found on the Big 
Horn and on the Missouri. 

" From the mouth of the Big Horn," says Pro- 
fessor Hayden, " to the union of the Yellowstone 
with the Missouri, nearly all the way, lignite (coal) 

beds occupy the whole country The beds 

are well developed, and at least twenty or thirty 
seams are shown, varying in purity and thickness 
from a few inches to seven feet " (Eeport, p. 59). 

The mountains are covered with wood, and there 
will be no lack of fuel in Montana. The timber 
lands of this Territory are estimated by the Land 
Commissioner to cover nearly twelve millions of 
acres, — an area as large as New Hampshire and 
Vermont combined. The agricultural land, or 
land that may be ploughed, is estimated at 
twenty-three million acres, nearly as much as is 
contained in the State of Oliio. The grazing lands 
are put down at sixty-nine millions, — or a region 
as large as New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jer- 
sey together ! 

Is n't it cold ? Are not tlie winters intolerable ? 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 87 

Are not the summers short in Montana ? Many 
times the questions have been asked. 

The temperature of the climate in winter will 
be seen from the following thermometrical record 
kept at Virginia City : — 

1866. Dec. Mean for the month, 31° above zero. 

1867. Jan. " " " 23°.73 " " 
" Feb. " " " 26° " " 

The summer climate is exceedingly agreeable, 
and admirably adapted to fruit culture. 

In July last Mr. Milnor Eoberts, Mr. Thomas 
Canfield, and other gentlemen of the Pacific ex- 
ploring party, were -in Montana. Mr. Eoberts 
makes our mouths water by his description of the - 
fruits of that Territory. 

" Missoula," he says, " is a thriving young town 
near the western base of the Eocky Mountains, 
containing a grist-mill, saw-mill, two excellent 
stores, and from twenty-five to thirty dwellings, a 
number of them Avell built. I visited McWliirk's 
garden of five acres, where I found ripe tomatoes, 
watermelons, muskmelons, remarkably fine pota- 
toes, beans, peas, and squashes ; also young apple- 
trees and other fruit-trees, and a very fine collec- 
tion of flowers ; and all this had been brought 
about from the virgin soil in two years, and would 
this year (1869) yield the owner over two thousand 
dollars in gold, the only currency known in Mon- 
tana" (Eeport, p. 23). 



88 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Tliis fruit and flower garden is about one hun- 
dred miles from the top of the divide between the 
Atlantic and the Pacific. 

Deer Lodge City, fifteen miles from the dividing 
ridge, is situated in the Deer Lodge Valley, and its 
attractions are thus set forth by Mr. Eoberts : — 

" The Deer Lodge Valley is very wide, in places 
ten to fifteen miles from the hills on one side to 
the hills on the other, nearly level, and everywhere 
clothed with rich grass, upon which we observed 
numerous herds of tame cattle and horses feeding. 
The Deer Lodge Creek flows through it, and adds 
immensely to its value as an agricultural region. 
Some farms are cultivated ; but farming is yet in 
its infancy, and there are thousands of acres of 
arable land here and elsewhere in Montana await- 
ing settlement " (p. 25). 

West of Montana is Idaho, containing eighty-six 
thousand square miles, — large enough for two 
States of the size of Ohio. Nearly all of this 
Territory lies north of the 43d parallel. It is wa- 
tered by the Columbia and its tributaries, — moun- 
tain streams fed by melting snows. 

" The mountains of Idaho," says the Land Com- 
missioner, in his exhaustive Eeport for 1869, '' often 
attain great altitude, having peaks rising above the 
line of perpetual snow, their lower slopes being 
furrowed with numerous streams and alternately 
clothed with magnificent forests and rich grasses. 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 89 

The plains are elevated table-lands covered with 
indigenous grasses, constituting pasturage unsur- 
passed in any section of our country. Numerous 
large flocks of sheep and herds of domestic cattle 
now range these pastures, requiring but little other 
sustenance throughout the entire year, and no 
protection from the weather other than that af- 
forded by the lower valleys or the canons, in which 
many of the streams take their way through the 
upland country. The valleys are beautiful, fertile 
depressions of the surface, protected from the 
searching winds of summer and searching blasts 
of winter, each intersected by some considerable 
stream, adjoinmg which on either bank, and ex- 
tending to the commencement of the rise of table- 
land or mountain, are broad stretches of prairies 
or meadows producing the richest grasses, and 
with the aid of irrigation, crops of grain, fruit, and 
vegetables superior to those of any of the Eastern 
States, and rivalling the vegetation of the Missis- 
sippi Valley. The pastures of these valleys are 
generally uncovered with snow in the most severe 
winters, and afford excellent food for cattle and 
sheep, the herbage drying upon the stalk during 
the later summer and autumn months into a su- 
perior quality of hay. As no artificial shelter from 
the weather is here required for sheep or cattle, 
stock-raising is attended with but little outlay and 
is very profitable, promising soon to become one 



90 THE SEAT OF EMPIEE. 

of the greatest sources of wealth in this rapidly 
developing but stiU underrated Territory. It was 
considered totally valueless except for mining pur- 
poses, and uninviting to the agriculturist, until 
emigration disclosed its hidden resources. 

" It is the favorite custom of herdsmen in Idaho 
to reserve their lower meadows for winter pastures, 
allowing the stock to range the higher plains dur- 
ing spring, summer, and autumn ; the greater ex- 
tent of the table-lands, and the superior adapta- 
bihty of the valleys for agriculture presenting 
reasons for the adoption of this method as one of 
economical importance. 

" The climate of Idaho varies considerably with 
the degrees of latitude through which its limits 
extend, but not so much as would naturally be 
supposed from its great longitudinal extension ; 
the isothermal lines of the Territory, running from 
east to west, have a well-defined northward varia- 
tion, caused by the influence of air currents from 
the Pacific Ocean. Throughout the spring, sum- 
mer, and autumn months, in the northern as well 
as the southern sections, the Aveather is generally 
delightful and salubrious ; in the winter months 
the range of the thermometer depends greatly upon 
the altitude of the surface, — the hif>lier mountains 
being visited by extreme cold and by heavy falls 
of snow ; the lower mountain-ranges and the plains 
having winters generally less severe than those of 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 91 

northern Iowa and Wisconsin or central ]\Iinne- 
sota, while greater dryness of the atmosphere 
renders a lower fall of the thermometer less per- 
ceptible ; and the valleys being rarely visited by 
cold weather, high winds, or considerable falls of 
snow. Considered in its yearly average, the cli- 
mate is exactly adapted to sheep-growing and the 
production of wool, the herding of cattle, and 
manufacture of dairy products, the raising of 
very superior breeds of horses, as well as the 
culture of all Northern varieties of fruits, such 
as apples, pears, plums, cherries, peaches, grapes, 
and all of the ordinary cereals and vegetables " (p. 
164.) 

This is all different from what we have con- 
ceived the Eocky Mountains to be. 

When the government reports of the explorations 
of 1853 were issued, Jeff Davis was Secretary of 
War, and he deliberately falsified the report of Gov- 
ernor Stevens's explorations from Lake Superior 
to the valley of the Columbia. Governor Stevens 
reported that the route passed through a region 
highly susceptible of agriculture; but the Secre- 
tary of War, even then plotting treason, in his 
summary of the advantages of the various routes, 
asserted that Governor Stevens had overstated the 
facts, and that tliere were not more than 1,000 
square miles, or 640,000 acres, of agricultural lands. 
The Land Commissioner in his Eeport estimates the 



92 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

amount of agricultural lands at 16,925,000 acres. 
The amount of improved lands in Ohio in 1860 
was 12,665,000 acres, or more than 4,000,000 less 
than the available agricultural lands in Idaho. 
These are lands that need no irrigation. Of such 
lands there are 14,000,000 acres, which, in the lan- 
guage of the Commissioner, are "redeemable by- 
irrigation into excellent pasture and agricultural 
lands." The grazing - lands are estimated at 
5,000,000 acres, the tunbered lands at 7,500,000 
acres, besides 8,000,000 acres of mineral lands. Al- 
though the population of Idaho probably does not 
exceed 50,000, half of whom are engaged in min- 
ing, the value of the agricultural products for 1868 
amounted to $ 12,000,000, while the mineral pro- 
duct was $ 10,000,000. 

Passing on to Oregon we find a State containing 
95,000 square miles, two and a half times larger 
than Ohio. 

"Oregon," says General Wilson, in his Eeport 
upon the public lands, " is peculiarly a crop-raising 
and fruit-growing State, though by no means de- 
ficient in valuable mineral resources. Possessing 
a climate of unrivalled salubrity, abounding in 
vast tracts of rich arable lands, heavily timbered 
throughout its mountain ranges, watered by innu- 
merable springs and streams, and subject to none 
of the drawbacks arising from the chilling winds 
and seasons of aridity which prevail farther south. 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 93 

it is justly considered the most favored region on 
the Pacific slope as a home for an agricultural and 
manufacturing population " (p. 197). 

Of " western Oregon/' he says, " the portion of 
the State first settled embraces about 31,000 
square miles, or 20,000,000 acres, being nearly one 
third of the area of the whole State, and con- 
tains the great preponderance of population and 
wealth. Nearly the whole of this large extent of 
country is valuable for agriculture and grazing; 
all of the productions common to temperate re- 
gions may be cultivated here with success. When 
the land is properly cultivated, the farmer rarely 
fails to meet with an adequate reward for his la- 
bors. The fruits produced here, such as apples, 
pears, plums, quinces, and grapes, are of supe- 
rior quality and flavor. Large quantities of ap- 
ples are annually shipped to the San Francisco 
market, where they usually command a higher 
price than those of California, owing to their finer 
flavor. 

"The valleys of the Willamette, Umpqua, and 
Eouge Elvers, are embraced within this portion 
of the State, and there is no region of country on 
the continent presenting a finer field for agriculture 
and stock-raising, because of the mildness of the 
climate and the depth and richness of the soil. 
Farmers make no provision for housing their cattle 
during winter, and none is required ; although in 



94 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

about the same latitude as Maine on tlie Atlantic, 
the winter temperature corresponds with that of 
Savannah, Georgia" (p. 194). 

ISTorth of Oregon lies the Territory of Washing- 
ton, containing 70,000 square miles, lacking only 
9,000 to make it twice as large as Ohio. 

Our camp, where I am taking this westward 
look, is pitched very near the 47th parallel, may 
be five or six miles north of it. If I were to travel 
due west along the x)arallel a little more than 
twelve hundred miles, 1 should reach Olympia, the 
capital of the Territory, situated on Puget Sound, 
— the name given to that vast ramification of wa- 
ters known as the Strait of Juan de Fuca, Admi- 
ralty Inlet, Hood's Canal, and Puget Sound, with a 
shore line of 1,500 miles. 

"There is no State in the Union," says the 
Land Commissioner, " and perhaps no country in 
the world of the same extent, that offers so many 
harbors and such excellent facilities for commerce " 
(p. 198). 

The timbered lands of Washington are approxi- 
mately estimated at 20,000,000 acres, and the prai- 
rie lands cover an area equally great. Tlie forests 
embrace the red and yellow pine of gigantic 
growth, often attaining the height of three hun- 
dred feet, and from nine to twelve feet in diameter. 
It is said that a million feet have been cut from a 
single acre ! Says the Commissioner, " The soil 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 95 

in the river-bottoms is thinly timbered with 
maple, ash, and willoAV. These lands yield heavy 
crops of wheat, barley, and oats, while vegetables 
attain enormous size. The highlands are generally 

rolling, and well adapted to cultivation The 

average yield of potatoes to the acre is six hun- 
dred bushels, wheat forty, peas sixty, timothy-hay 
five tons, and oats seventy bushels " (p. 199). 

Mr. Eoberts, who explored this region last year, 
says that the great plain of the Columbia is " a 
high rolling prairie, covered everywhere abundant- 
ly with bunch-grass to the summits of the highest 
liills ; treeless, excepting along the streams. This 
is an immense grazing area of the most superior 
character, interspersed with the valleys of peren- 
nial streams, along which are lands that, when 
settled by industrious farmers, will be of the most 
productive character, as we have seen in the case 
of a number of improvements already made ; 
while the climate is not only salubrious, but re- 
markably attractive" (Eeport, p. 19). 

He gives this estimate of the area suited to 
agriculture and grazino-: — 

" In Washington Territory alone, on its eastern 
side, there are at least 20,000 square miles, or 
12,800,000 acres of the finest grazing-lands, on 
which thousands of cattle and sheep will be raised 
as cheaply as in any other quarter of the globe, 
and this grass is so nutritious that the cattle raised 



96 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

upon it cannot be surpassed in their weight and 
quality. Snow rarely falls to sufficient depth to 
interfere seriously with their grazing all through 
the winter. Such may be taken as a general view 
upon this important point, respecting a Territory 
nearly half as large as the State of Pennsylvania " 
(p. 19). 

Along the shores of Puget Sound, and on the 
island of Vancouver, are extensive deposits of 
bituminous coal, conveniently situated for the fu- 
ture steam-marine of the Pacific. Large quanti- 
ties are now shipped to San Francisco for the use 
of the Pacific mail-steamers. 

'Not only in Washington, but up the coast of 
British Columbia, the coal-deposits crop out in 
numerous places. 

An explorer on Simpson Eiver, which next to 
the Eraser is the largest in British Columbia, thus 
writes to Governor Douglas : " I saw seams of coal 
to-day fifteen feet thick, better than any mined at 
Vancouver " (Parhamentary Blue-Book.) 

Coal in Montana, in Idaho, in Washington, on 
Vancouver, in British Columbia ; coal on the^ 
Missouri, the Yellowstone, the Columbia, the 
Eraser; coal on Simpson Eiver, coal in Alaska ! 
Measureless forests all over the Pacific slope ! 
timber enough for all the world, masts and spars 
sufficient for the mercantile marine of every nation ! 
Great rivers, ^thousands of waterfalls, unequalled 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 97 

facilities for manufacturing ! An agricultural re- 
gion unsur23assed for fertility ! Exliaustless min- 
eral wealth ! Fisheries equalling those of New- 
foundland, — salmon in every stream, cod and 
herring abounding along the coast ! !N'othing 
wanting for a varied industry. 

Unfold the map of North America and look at 
its western coast. From Panama northward there 
is no harbor that can ever be available to the com- 
merce of the Pacific till we reach the Bay of San 
Francisco. From thence northward to the Colum- 
bia the waves of the sea break against rugged 
mountains. The Columbia pours its waters through 
the Coast Eange, but a bar at its mouth has prac- 
tically closed it to commerce. Not till we reach 
Puget Sound do we find a good harbor. North of 
that magnificent gateway are numberless bays and 
inlets. Like the coast of Maine, there is a harbor 
every five or ten miles, where ships may ride in 
safety, sheltered from storms, and open at all sea- 
sons of the year. There never will be any ice- 
bound ships on the coast of British Columbia, for 
the warm breath of the tropics is felt there through- 
out the year. 

^Vliile the map is unfolded, look at Puget Sound, 
and think of its connection with Japan and China. 
Latitude and longitude are to be taken into ac- 
count when we make long journeys. Liverpool is 
between the 53d and 54th parallels, or about two 



98 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

hundred and sixty miles farther north than Puget 
Sound, where a degree of longitude is only 
thirty-five miles in length. Puget Sound is on the 
49th parallel, where the degrees are thirty-eight 
and a half miles in lengtli. San Francisco is near 
the 37th parallel, where the degrees are nearly 
forty-nine miles in length. Liverpool is three de- 
grees west of Greenwich, from which longitude is 
reckoned. The 12 2d meridian passes through Pu- 
get Sound and also through the Bay of San Fran- 
cisco. It follows from all this that the distance 
from Liverpool in straight lines to these two mag- 
nificent gateways of the Pacific, in geographical 
miles, is as follows : — 

Liverpool to San Francisco . 4,879 miles. 
" Puget Sound . .4,487 " 

Difference, 392 " 

Looking across the Pacific we see that Yoko- 
hama is on the 35th j)arallel, w^here a degree of 
longitude is forty-nine miles in length. Eeckon- 
ing the distance across the Pacific between Yoko- 
hama and the western gateways of the continent, 
we have this comparison : — 

San Francisco to Yokohama . 4,856 miles. 
Puget Sound " " . . 4,294 " 



Difference, 5 02 " 
Adding these differences together, we see that Ion- 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTH\YEST. 99 

gitude alone makes a total of nine liiindred and 
fifty-four miles in favor of Puget Sound between 
Liverpool and Yokoliama. When tlie ISTortliern 
Pacific Piailroad is completed, Chicago will be fully 
six hundred miles nearer Asia by Puget Sound 
than by San Francisco. 

Vessels sailing from Japan to San Francisco 
follow the Kuro-Siwo, the heated river, which 
of itself bears them towards Puget Sound at the 
rate of eighty miles a day. They follow it into 
northern latitudes till within three or foar hun- 
dred miles of the coast of British Columbia, then 
shape their course southward past Puget Sound to 
the Golden Gate. 

In navigation, then, Asia is nearly, if not quite, 
one thousand miles nearer the ports of Puget 
Sound than San Francisco. The time will come 
when not only Puget Sound, but every bay and 
inlet of the northwest coast, will be whitened 
with sails of vessels bringing the products of the 
Orient, not only for those who dwell upon the 
Pacific slope, but for the mighty multitude of the 
Empire of the Northwest, of the Mississippi Val- 
ley, and the Atlantic States. 

From those land-locked harbors steamships 
shall depart for other climes, freighted with the 
products of this region, spun and woven, ham- 
mered and smelted, sawed and planed, by the 
millions of industrious workers who are to im- 



100 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

prove the unparalleled capabilities of this vast 
domain. 

There is not on the face of the globe a country 
so richly endowed as this of the Northwest. Here 
we find every element necessary for the develop- 
ment of a varied industry, — agricultural, mining, 
manufacturing, mercantile, and commercial, — all 
this with a climate like that of southern Trance, 
or central and northern EuroxDe. 

" The climate," says Mr. Eoberts, " of this fa- 
vored region is very remarkable, and will always 
remain an attractive feature; which must, there- 
fore, aid greatly in the speedy settlement of this 
portion of the Pacific coast. Even in the cold- 
est winters there is practically no obstruction 
to navigation from ice ; vessels can enter and 
depart at all times ; and the winters are so 
mild that summer flowers which in the latitude 
of Philadelphia, on the Atlantic coast, we are 
obliged to place in the hot-house, are left out in the 
open garden without being injured. The cause of 
this mildness is usually, and I think correctly, 
ascribed to the warm-water equatorial current, 
which, impinging against the Pacific coast, north 
of the Strait of Juan de Euca, passes along nearly 
parallel with the shore, diffusing its genial warmth 
over the land far into the interior. Of the fact 
there is no doubt, whatever may be the cause" 
(Pteport, p. 14). 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 101 

The climate of eastern Washington, amid the 
mountains, corresponds with that of Pennsylvania ; 
but upon the sea-coast and along the waters of 
Puget Sound roses blossom in the open air through- 
out the year, and the residents gather green peas 
and strawberries in March and April. 

In a former view we looked at the territory be- 
longing to Great Britain lying east of the Eocky 
Mountains, we saw its capabilities for settlement ; 
but far different in its physical features is British 
Columbia from the Saskatchawan country. It is 
a land of mountains, plains, valleys, and forests, 
threaded by rivers, and indented by bays and inlets. 
The main branch of the Columbia rises in the Brit- 
ish Possessions, between the Cascade Eange and 
the Eocky Mountains. There is a great amphi- 
theatre between those two ranges, having an area 
of forty-five thousand square miles. We hardly 
comprehend, even Avith a map spread out before 
us, that there is an area larger than Ohio in the 
basin drained by the northern branch of the Colum- 
bia. But such is the fact, and it is represented 
as being a fertile and attractive section, possessed 
of a mild and equable climate. The stock-raisers 
of southern Idaho drive their cattle by the ten 
thousand into British Columbia to find winter pas- 
turage ! 

The general characteristics of that area have been 
fully set forth in a paper read before the Eoyal 



102 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Geograpliical Society of London by Lieutenant 
Palmer of the Eoyal Engineers. He says : — 

" The scenery of the Avhole midland belt, espe- 
cially of that portion of it lying to the east of the 
124th meridian, is exceedingly beautiful and pic- 
turesque. The highest uplands are all more or less 
thickly timbered, but the valleys present a delight- 
ful panorama of woodland and prairie, flanked 
by miles of rolling hills, swelling gently from the 
margin of streams, and picturesquely dotted with 
yellow pines. The forests are almost entirely free 
from underwood, and with the exception of a few 
worthless tracts, the whole face of the country — 
hill and dale, woodland and plain — is covered with 
an abundant growth of grass, possessing nutritious 
qualities of the highest order. Hence its value to 
the colony as a grazing district is of the highest 
importance. Cattle and horses are found to thrive 
wonderfully on the 'bunch' grass, and to keej^ 
in excellent condition at all seasons. The whole 
area is more or less available for grazing purposes. 
Thus the natural pastures of the middle belt may 
be estimated at hundreds, or even thousands, of 
square miles. 

" JSTotwithstanding the elevation, the seasons ex- 
hibit no remarkable extremes of temperature ; the 
winters, though sharp enough for all the rivers and 
lakes to freeze, are calm and clear, so that the cold, 
even when most severe, is not keenly felt. Snow 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 103 

seldom exceeds eighteen inches in depth, and in 
many valleys of moderate elevation cattle often 
range at large during the winter months, without 
requiring shelter or any food hut the natural 

grasses Judging from present experience, 

there can he no douht that in point of saluhrity 
the chmate of British Columhia excels that of 
Great Britain, and is indeed one of the finest in 
the world." 

In regard to the agricultural capahilities of this 
mountain region, the same author remarks : — 

" Here in sheltered and well-irrigated valleys, at 
altitudes of as much as 2,500 feet ahove the sea, a 
few farming experiments have been made, and the 
results have thus far been beyond measure encour- 
aging. At farms in the San Jose and Beaver val- 
leys, situated nearly 2,200 feet above the sea, and 
again at Fort Alexander, at an altitude of 1,450 
feet, wheat has been found to produce nearly forty 
bushels to the acre, and other grain and vegetable 

crops in proportion It may be asserted that 

two thirds at least of this eastern division of the 
central belt may, when occasion arrives, be turned 
to good account either for purposes of grazing or 
tillage." 

Probably there are no streams, bays, or inlets in 
the world that so abound with fish as the salt and 
fresh waters of the northwest Pacific. The cod 
and herring fisheries are equal to those of JSTew- 



104 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

foundland, while every stream descending from the 
mountains literally swarms with salmon. 

In regard to the fisheries of British Columbia, 
Lieutenant Palmer says : — 

" The whole of the inlets, bays, rivers, and lakes 
of British Columbia abound with delicious fish. 
The quantity of salmon that ascend the Fraser and 
other rivers on the coast seems incredible. They 
first enter Fraser and other rivers in March, and 
are followed in rapid succession by other varieties, 
which continue to arrive mitil the approach of 
winter ; but the great runs occur in July, August, 
and September. During these months so abundant 
is the supply that it may be asserted without ex- 
aggeration, that some of the smaller streams can 
hardly be forded without stepping upon them." 
(Journal of the Geographical Society.) 

All ! would n't it be glorious sport to pull out 
the twenty-five-pounders from the foaming waters 
of the Columbia, — to land them, one after another, 
on the grassy bank, and see the changing light 
upon their shining scales ! and then sitting down 
to dinner to have one of the biggest on a platter, 
delicately baked or boiled, with prairie chicken, 
plover, pigeon, and wild duck ! We will have it 
by and by, when Governor Smith and Judge Eice, 
who are out here seeing about the railroad, get the 
cars running to the Pacific ; they will supply all 
creation east of the Kocky Mountains with salmon ! 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 105 

There are not many of us who can afford to dine 
off salmon when it is a dollar a pound, and the 
larger part of the crowd can never have a taste 
even ; but these railroad gentlemen will bring 
about a new order of things. When they get the. 
locomotive on the completed track, and make the 
run from the Columbia to Chicago in about sixty 
hours, as they will be able to do, all hands of us 
who work for our daily bread will be able to have 
fresh salmon at cheap rates. 

Wliat a country ! I have drawn a hypothetical 
line from Milwaukie to the Pacific, — not that the 
region south of it — Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, or 
California — does not abound in natural resour- 
ces, with fruitful soil and vast capabilities, but be- 
cause the configuration of the continent — the 
water-systems, the mountain-ranges, the eleva- 
tions and depressions, the soil and climate — is 
in many respects different north of the 43d par- 
allel from what it is south of it. We need not look 
upon the territory now held by Great Britain with 
a covetous eye. The 49th parallel is an imaginary 
line running across the prairies, an arbitrary polit- 
ical boundary which N'ature will not take into 
account in her disposition of affairs in the future. 
Sooner or later the line will fade away. Eailway 
trains — the constant passing and repassing of a 
multitude of people speaking the same language, 
having ideas in common, and related by blood — 

5* 



106 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

will rub it out, and there will be one country, one 
people, one government. What an empire then ! 
The region west of Lake Michigan and north of 
the latitude of Milwaukie — the 43d parallel ex- 
tended to the Pacific — will give to the nation, to 
say nothing of Alaska Territory, forty States as 
large as Ohio, or two hundred States of the size 
of Massachusetts ! 

I have been accustomed to look upon this part 
of the world as being so far north, so cold, so 
snowy, so distant, — and all the other imaginary 
so's, — that it never could be available for settle- 
ment ; but the facts show that it is as capable of 
settlement as New York or Ncav England, — that 
the country along the Athabasca has a climate no 
more severe than that of northern New Hamp- 
shire or Maine, while the summers are more favor- 
able to the growing of grains than those of the 
northern Atlantic coast. 

It is not, therefore, hypothetical geography. Fol- 
lowing the 43d parallel eastward, we find it passing 
along the northern shore of the Mediterranean, 
through central Italy, and through the heart of 
the Turkish Empire. Nearly all of Euroj)e lies 
north of it, — the whole of France, half of Italy, 
the whole of the Austrian Empire, and aU of 
Eussia's vast dominions. 

The entire wheat-field of Europe is above that 
parallel. The valleys of the Alps lying between 



I 



THE EMPIRE OF THE NORTHWEST. 107 

the 46tli and 50tli parallels swarm with an in- 
dustrious people ; why may not those of the Eocky 
Mountains at the head-waters of the Missouri and 
Columbia in like manner be hives of industry in 
the future ? 

If a Christiania, a Stockholm, and a St. Peters- 
burg, with golden-domed churches, gorgeous pal- 
aces, and abodes of comfort, can be built up in 
lat. 60 in the Old World, why may we not ex- 
pect to see their counterpart in the New, when 
we take into account the fact that a heated cur- 
rent from the tropics gives the same mildness of 
climate to the northwestern section of this conti- 
nent that the Gulf Stream gives to northern Eu- 
rope ? 

"With this outlook towards future possibilities, 
we see Minnesota the central State gf the Conti- 
nental Eepublic of the future. 

With the map of the continent before me, I 
stick a pin into Minneapolis, and stretch a string 
to Halifax, then, sweeping southward, find that 
it cuts through southern Florida, and central 
Mexico. It reaches almost to San Diego, the ex- 
treme southwestern boundary of the United States, 
— reaches to Donner Pass on the summit of the 
Sierra Nevadas, within a hundred miles of Sac- 
ramento. Stretching it due west, it reaches to 
Salem, Oregon. Carrying it northwest, I find that 
it reaches to the Kockv Mountain House on Peace 



108 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Eiver, — to that region whose beauty charmed 
Mackenzie and Father De Smet. The Peace Eiver 
flows through the Eocky Mountains, and at its 
head-waters we find the lowest pass of the conti- 
nent. The time may come when we of the East 
will whirl through it upon the express-train bound 
for Sitka ! It is two hundred miles from the Eocky 
Mountain House to that port of southern Alaska. 

The city of Mexico is nearer Minneapolis by 
nearly a hundred miles than Sitka. Trinity Bay 
on the eastern coast of Newfoundland, Puerto 
Principe on the island of Cuba, the Bay of Hon- 
duras in Central America, and Sitka, are equidis- 
tant from Minneapolis and St. Paul. 

When Mr. Seward, in 1860, addressed the people 
of St. Paul from the steps of the Capitol, it was 
the seer, and not the politician, who said : — 

" / now helieve that the ultimate last seat of gov- 
ernment on this great continent will he found some- 
where within a circle or radius not far from the 
spot on which I stand, at the head of navigation 07i 
the Mississippi Biver I " 



THE FRONTIER. 109 

CHAPTER V. 

THE FRONTIER. 

BOTTINEAU is our guide. Take a look at 
liim as he sits by the camp-fire cleaning 
his rifle. He is tall and well formed, with features 
which show both his French and Indian parent- 
age. He has dark whiskers, a broad, flat nose, a 
wrinkled forehead, and is in the full prime of life. 
His name is known throughout the Northwest, — 
among Americans, Canadians, and Indians. The 
Chippewa is his mother-tongue, though he can 
speak several Indian dialects, and is fluent in 
French and English. He was born not far from 
Fort Garry, and has traversed the vast region of 
the Northwest in every direction. He was Gover- 
nor Stevens's guide when he made the first explora- 
tions for the Northern Pacific Railroad, and has 
guided a great many government trains to the 
forts on the Missouri since then. He was with 
General Sully in his campaign against the Indians. 
He has the instinct of locality. Like the honey- 
bee, which flies straight from the flower to its hive, 
over fields, through forests, across ravines or inter- 
vening liills, so Pierre Bottineau knows just where 
to go when out upon the boundless prairie with 



110 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

no landmark to guide him. He is never lost, even 
in the darkest night or foggiest day. 

There is no man living, probably, who has 
more enemies than he, for the whole Sioux nation 
of Indians are his sworn foes. They w^ould take 
his scalp instantly if they could only get a chance. 
He has been in many fights with them, — has 
killed six of them, has had narrow escapes, and 
to hear him tell of his adventures makes your 
hair stand on end. He is going to conduct a por- 
tion of our party through the Sioux country. The 
Indians are friendly now, and the party will not 
be troubled ; but if a Sioux buffalo-hunter comes 
across this guide there will be quick shooting on 
both sides, and ten to one the Indian will go down, 
— for Bottineau is keen-sighted, has a steady 
hand, and is quick to act. 

The westward -bound members of our party, 
guided by Bottineau, will be accompanied by an 
escort consisting of nineteen soldiers commanded 
by Lieutenant Kelton. Four Indian scouts, mount- 
ed on ponies, are engaged to scour the country in 
advance, and give timely notice of the presence of 
Sioux, who are always on the alert to steal horses 
or plunder a train. 

Bidding our friends good by, we watch their 
train winding over the prairie till we can only see 
the white canvas of the wagons on the edge of the 
horizon ; then, turning eastward, we cross the river 



THE FRONTIER. Ill 

into Minnesota, and strike out upon the pathless 
plain. We see no landmarks ahead, and, like navi- 
gators Tipon the ocean, pursue our way over this 
sea of verdure by the compass. 

After a few hours' ride, we catch, through the 
glimmering haze, the faint outlines of islands ris- 
ing above the unruffled waters of a distant lake. 
We approach its shores, but only to see islands 
and lake alike vanish into thin air. It was the 
mirage lifting above the horizon the far-off* groves 
of Buffalo Creek, a branch of the Eed Eiver. 

Far away to the east are the Leaf Hills, which 
are only the elevations of the rolling prairie that 
forms the divide between the waters flowing into 
the Gulf of Mexico and into Hudson Bay. 

Wishing to see the hills, to ascertain what ob- 
stacles tliere are to' the construction of a railroad, 
two of us break away from the main party and 
strike out over the plains, promising to be in 
camp at nightfall. How exhilarating to gallop 
over the pathless expanse, amid a sea of flowers, 
plunging now and then througli grass so high that 
horse and rider are almost lost to sight ! The 
meadow-lark greets us with his cheerful song ; the 
plover hovers around us ; sand-hill cranes, flying 
always in pairs, rise from the ground and wing 
their way beyond the reach of harm. The gophers 
chatter like children amid the flowers, as we ride 
over their subterranean towns. 



112 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

They are in peaceful possession of the solitude. 
Five years ago buffaloes were roaming here. We 
see their bones bleaching in the sun. Here the 
Sioux and Chippewas hunted them down. Here 
the old bulls fought out their battles, and the 
countless herds cropped the succulent grasses and 
drank the clear running water of the stream which 
bears their name. They are gone forever. The ox 
and cow of the farm are coming to take their place. 
Sheep and horses will soon fatten on the rich pas- 
turage of these hills. We of the East would hardly 
call them hills, much less mountains, the slopes 
are so gentle and the altitudes so low. The high- 
est grade of a railroad would not exceed thirty 
feet to the mile in crossing them. 

Here we find granite and limestone bowlders, 
and in some places beds of grav^, brought, so 
the geologists inform us, from the far ]N"orth and 
deposited here when the primeval ocean currents 
set southward over this then submerged region. 
They are in the right place for the railroad. The 
stone will be needed for abutments to bridges, 
and the gravel will be wanted for , ballast, — pro- 
vided the road is located in this vicinity. 

On our second day's march we come to what 
might with propriety be called the park region of 
Minnesota. It lies amid the high lands of the 
divide. It is more beautiful even than the coun- 
try around White Bear Lake and in the vicinity 



\ 



THE FRONTIER. 113 

of Glenwood. Throughout the day we behold 
such rural scenery as can only be found amid the 
most lovely spots in England. 

Think of rounded hills, with green slopes, — of 
parks and countless lakes, — skirted by forests, 
fringed with rushes, perfumed by tiger-lilies — the 
waves rippling on gravelled beaches; wild geese, 
ducks, loons, pelicans, and innumerable water-fowl 
building their nests amid the reeds .and rushes, — 
think of lawns blooming with flowers, elk and deer 
browsing in the verdant meadows. This is their 
haunt. We see their tracks along the sandy shores, 
but they keep beyond the range of our rifles. 

So wonderfully has nature adorned this section, 
that it seems as if we were riding through a coun- 
try that has been long under cultivation, and that 
behind yonder hillock we shall find an old castle, 
a mansion, or, at least, a farm-house, as we find 
them in Great Britain. 

I do not forget that I am seeing Minnesota at 
its best season, that it is midsummer, that the win- 
ters are as long as in New England ; but I can say 
without reservation, that nowhere in the wide world 
— not even in old England, the most finished of 
all lands ; not in la hclle France, or sunny Italy, or 
in the valley of the Ganges or the Yangtse, or on 
the slopes of the Sierra Nevadas — have I beheld 
anything approaching this in natural beauty. 

How it would look in winter I cannot say, but 



114 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the members of our party are unanimous in their 
praises of this portion of Minnesota. The nearest 
pioneer is forty miles distant ; "but land so in- 
Adting will soon be taken up by settlers. 

It was a pleasure, after three days' travel over 
the trackless wild, to come suddenly and unex- 
pectedly upon a hay-field. There were the swaths 
newly mown. There was no farm-house in sight, 
no fenced area or upturned furrow, but the hay- 
makers had been there. We were approaching 
civilization once more. Ascending a hill, we came 
in sight of a settler, a pioneer who is always on 
the move ; who, when a neighbor comes within 
six or eight miles of him, abandons his home and 
moves on to some spot where he can have more 
elbow-room, — to a region not so thickly peopled. 

He informed us that we should find the old 
trail we were searching for about a mile ahead. 
He had long matted hair, beard hanging upon his 
breast, a wrinkled countenance, wore a slouched 
felt hat, an old checked-cotton shirt, and panta- 
loons so patched and darned, so variegated in color, 
that it would require much study to determine 
what was original texture and what patch and 
darn. He came from Ohio in his youth, and has 
always been a skirmisher on the advancing line of 
civilization, — a few miles ahead of the main body. 
He was thinking now of going into the " bush," as 
he phrased it. 



I 



THE FRONTIER. 115 

Settlers farther down the trail informed us that 
he was a little flighty and queer; that he could 
not be induced to stay long in one place, but was 
always on the move for a more quiet neighborhood ! 

The road that we reached at this point was for- 
merly traversed by the French and Indian traders 
between Pembina and the Mississippi, but has not 
been used much of late years. Strildng that, we 
should have no difficulty in reaching the settle- 
ments of the Otter-Tail, forty miles south. 

Emigration travels fast. As fires blown by 
winds sweep through the dried grass of the prai- 
ries, so civilization spreads along the frontier. 

We reached the settlement on Saturday night, 
and pitched our tents for the Sabbath. It was a 
rare treat to these people to come into our camp 
and hear a sermon from Eev. Dr. Lord. The oldest 
member of the colony is a woman, now in her eigh- 
tieth year, with eye undimmed and a countenance 
remarkably free from the marks of age, who walks 
with a firm step after fourscore years of labor. 
Sixty years ago she moved from Lebanon, New 
Hampshire, a young wife, leaving tlie valley of the 
Connecticut for a home in the State of New York, 
then moving with the great army of emigrants to 
Oliio, Illinois, Missouri, and Iowa in succession, 
and now beginning again in Minnesota. Last year 
her hair, which had been as white as the purest 
snow, began to take on its original color, and is 



116 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

now quite dark ! There are but few instances on 
record of sucli a renewal of youth. 

The party have come from central Iowa to make 
this their future home, preferring the climate of 
this region, where the changes of temperature are 
not so sudden and variable. The women and chil- 
dren of the four families lived here alone for six 
weeks, while the men were away after their stock. 
Their nearest neighbors are twelve miles distant. 
On the 4th of July all hands — men, women, and 
children — travelled forty-five miles to celebrate 
the day. 

" We felt," said one of the women, " that we 
could n't get through the year without going some- 
where or seeing somebody. It is kinder lonely so 
far away from folks, and so we went down country 
to a picnic." 

Store, church, and school are all forty miles 
away, and till recently the nearest saw-mill was 
sixty miles distant. I^ow they can get their 
wdieat ground by going forty miles. 

The settlement is already blooming with half a 
dozen children. Other emigrants are coming, and 
these people are looking forward to next year 
with hope and confidence, for then they will have 
a school of their own. 

In our march south from Detroit Lake we meet 
a large number of Chippewa Indians going to the 
Eeservation recently assigned them by the govern- 



THE FRONTIER. 117 

ment in one of the fairest sections of Minnesota. 
Among them we see several women with blue 
eyes and light hair and fair complexions, who 
■ have French blood in their veins, and possibly 
some of them may have had American fathers. 
I^early all of the Indians wear pantaloons and 
jackets ; but here and there we see a brave who 
is true to liis ancestry, who is proud of his lineage 
and race, and is in all respects a savage, in mocca- 
sons, blanket, skunk-skin head-dress, and painted 
eagle's feathers. 

They are friendly, inoffensive, and indolent, and 
took no part in the late war. They have been in 
close contact with the whites for a long time, but 
they do not advance in civilization. All efforts 
for their elevation are like rain-drops falling on a 
cabbage-leaf, that roll off and leave it dry. There 
is little absorption on the part of the Indians ex- 
cept of whiskey, and in that respect their powers 
are gTeat, — equal to those of the driest toper in 
Boston or anywhere else devoting all his energies 
to getting round the Prohibitory Law. 

Our halting-place for Monday night is on the 
bank of the Otter-Tail, near Eush Lake. The 
tents are pitched, the camp-fire Idndled, supper 
eaten, and we are sitting before a pile of blazing 
logs. The dew is falling, and th^ fire is comfort- 
able and social. We look into the glowing coals 
and think of old times, and of friends far away. 



118 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

We dream of home. Then the jest and the story 
go round. The song would follow if we had the 
singers. But music is not w^anting. We hear 
martial strains, — of cornets, trombones, ophi- 
cleides, and horns, and the beating of a drum. 
Torches gleam upon the horizon, and by their 
flickering light we see a band advancing over the 
prairie. It is a march of welcome to the N'orthern 
Pacific Exploring Party. 

Not an hour ago these musicians heard of our 
arrival, and here they are, twelve of them, in our 
camp, doing their best to express their joy. They 
are Germans, — all young men. Three years ago 
several families came here from Ohio. They re- 
ported the soil so fertile, the situation so attrac- 
tive, the prospects so flattering, that others came ; 
and now they have a dozen families, and more are 
coming to this land of promise. 

Take a good long look at these men as they 
stand before our camp-fire, with their bright new 
instruments in their hands. They received them 
only three weeks ago from Cincinnati. 

" We can't play much yet," says the leader, Mr. 
Bertenheimer, " but we do the best we can. We 
have sent to Toledo for a teacher who will spend 
the winter with us. You will pardon our poor 
playing, but we^ felt so good when we heard you 
were here looking out a route for a railroad, that 
we felt like doing something to show our good- 



THE FKONTIEE. 119 

will. You see we are just getting started, and 
have to work hard, but we wanted some recreation, 
and we concluded to get up a band. We thought 
it would be better than to be hanging round a 
grocery. We have n't any grocery yet, and if we 
keep sober, and give our attention to other things, 
perhaps we sha' n't have one, — which, I reckon, 
will be all the better for us." 

Plain and simple the words, but there is more 
in them than in many a windy speecli made on 
the rostrum or in legislative halls. Just getting 
started ! Yet here upon the frontier Art has 
planted herself. The flowers of civilization are 
blooming on the border. 

As we listen to the parting strains, and watch 
the receding forms, and look into the coals of our 
camp-iire after their departure, we feel that there 
must be a bright future for a commonwealth tliat 
can grow such fruit on the borders of the uncul- 
tivated wilderness. 

Now just ride out and see what has been done 
by these emigrants. Here is a field containing 
thirty acres of as fine wheat as grows in Minne- 
sota. It is just taking on the golden hue, and will 
be ready for the reaper next week. Beside it are 
twenty acres of oats, several acres of corn, an acre 
or two of potatoes. This is one farm only. On 
yonder slope there stands a two-storied house, of 
hewn loofs and shingled roof. See what adornment 



120 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the wife or daughter has given to the front yard, 
— verbenas, petunias, and nasturtiums, and round 
the door a living wreath of morning-glories. 

Cows chew their cud in the stable-yard, while 

" Drowsy tinklings lull the distant field " 

where the sheep are herded. 

We shall find the scene repeated on the adjoin- 
ing farm. Sheltered beneath the grand old forest- 
trees stands the little log church with a cross upon 
its roof, and here we see coming down the road 
the venerable father and teacher of the commu- 
nity, in long black gown and broad-brimmed hat, 
with a crucifix at his girdle. It is a Catholic 
community, and they brought their priest with 
them. 

In the morning we ride over smiling prairies, 
through groves of oak and maple, and behold in 
tlie distance a large territory covered with the 
lithe foliage of the tamarack. Here and there are 
groves of pine rising like islands above tlie wide 
level of the forest. 

At times our horses walk on pebbly beaches and 
splash their hoofs in the limpid waters of the 
lakes. We pick up agates, carnelians, and bits of 
bright red porphyiy, washed and worn by the 
waves. Wild swans rear their young in the reeds 
and marshes bordering the streams. They grace- 
fully glide over the still waters. They are beyond 
tlie reach of our rifies, and we would not harm 



THE FRONTIER. 121 

them if we could. There is a good deal of the 
savage left in a man who, under the plea of 
sport, can wound or kill a harmless bird or beast 
that cannot be made to serve his wants. It gives 
me pleasure to say that our party are not blood- 
thirsty. Ducks, plover, snipe, wild geese, and 
sand-hill cranes are served at our table, but they 
are never shot in w^anton spot. 

The stream which we have crossed several times 
is the Otter-Tail and flows southward into Otter- 
Tail Lake ; issuing from that it runs southwest, 
then west, then northward, taking the name of the 
Eed Eiver, and pours its waters into Lake Winni- 
peg. From that great northern reservoir the w^a- 
ters of this western region of Minnesota reach 
Hudson Bay through Nelson Eiver. 

Looking eastward we see gleaming in the morn- 
ing sunlight the Leaf Lakes, the head-waters of 
the Crow- Wing, one of the largest western tribu- 
taries of the Upper Mississippi. 

The neck of land between these lakes and the 
Otter-Tail is only one mile wide. Here, from time 
out of mind among the Indians, the transit has 
been made between the waters flowing into the 
Gulf of Mexico and into Hudson Bay. When 
the Jesuit missionaries came here, they found it 
the great Indian carrying-place. 

Mackenzie, Lord Selkirk, and all the early ad- 
venturers, came by this route on their way to Brit- 



122 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

ish America. For a long time it has been a trad- 
ing-post. The French Jesuit fathers were here a 
century ago and are here to-day, — not spiritual 
fathers alone, but according to the flesh as well ! 
The settlement is composed wholly of French Ca- 
nadians, their Indian wives and copper-colored 
children. Tliere are ten or a dozen houses, but they 
are very dilapidated. A little old man with twink- 
ling gray eyes, wearing a battered white hat, comes 
out to welcome us, while crowds of swarthy chil- 
dren and Indian women gaze at us from the door- 
w^ays. Another little old man, in a black gown 
and broad-brimmed hat, with a long chain and 
crucifix dangling from his girdle, salutes us with 
true French politeness. He is the priest, and is as 
seedy as the village itself. 

Around the place are several birch-bark Ind- 
ian huts, and a few lodges of tanned buffalo-hides. 
Filth, squalor, and degradation are the charac- 
teristics of the lodge, and the civilization of the 
lo£^-houses is but little removed from that of the 
wigwams. 

The French Canadian takes about as readily to 
the Indian maiden as to one of his own race. He 
is Idnder than the Indian brave, and when he 
wants a Avife he will find the fairest of the maidens 
ready to listen to his words of love. 



EOUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 123 

CHAPTEE VI. 

ROUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 

OUE lialting-place at noon furnishes a pleasing 
subject for a comic artist. Behold, us be- 
neath the shade of old oaks, our horses croj)ping 
the rank grass, a fire kindled against the tmnk of 
a tree that has braved the storms of centuries, each 
toasting a slice of salt pork. 

Governor, members of Congress, minister, judge, 
doctor, teamster, correspondent, — all hands are at 
it. Salt pork ! Does any one turn up his nose at 
it ? Do you think it hard fare ? Just come out 
here and try it, after a twenty-five-mile gallop on 
horseback, in this clear, bracing atmosphere, with 
twenty more miles to make before getting into 
camp. We slept in a tent last night ; had break- 
fast at 5 A. M. ; are camping by night and tramp- 
ing by day ; are bronzed by the sun ; and are 
roughing it ! The exercise of the day gives sweet 
sleep at night. We had a good appetite at break- 
fast, and now, at noon, are as liungry as bears. 
Salt pork is not of much account in a down-town 
eating-house, but out here it is epicurean fare. 

Just see the Ex-Governor of the Green Mountain 
State standing before the fire with a long stick in 



124 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

his hand, having three prongs like E"eptnne's trident. 
He is doing his pork to a beautiful brown. Now 
he lays it between two slices of bread, and eats it 
as if it were a most delicious morsel, — as it is. 

A dozen toasting-forks are held up to the glow- 
ing coals. A dozen slices of pork are sizzling. 
We are not all of us quite so scientific in our toast- 
ing: as the Ex-Governor in his. 

Although I have had camp-life before, and have 
fried flapjacks on an old iron shovel, I am subject 
to mishaps. There goes my pork into the ashes ; 
never mind ! I shall need less pepper. I job my 
trident into the slice, — flaming now, and turning to 
crisp, — hold it a moment before the coals, and slap 
it on my bread in season to save a little of the 
drip. 

Do I hear some one exclaim. How can he eat it ? 
Ah ! you who never have had experience on the 
prairies don't know the pleasures of such a lunch. 

ISTow, because we are all as jolly as we can be, 
because I have praised salt pork, I would n't have 
everybody rushing out here to try it, as they have 
rushed to the Adirondacks, fired to a high pitch of 
enthusiasm by the spirited descriptions of the 
pleasures of the wilderness by the pastor of the 
Boston Park Street Church. What is sweet to me 
may be sour to somebody else. I should not like 
this manner of life all the time, nor salt pork for 
a steady diet. 



ROUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 125 

Wooded prairies, oak openings, hills and vales, 
watered by lakes and ponds, — sucli is the character 
of the region lying south of Otter-Tail. Over all 
this section the water is as pure as that gurgling 
from the hillsides of E"ew Hampshire. 

Minnesota is one of the best-watered States of 
the Union. The thousands of lakes and ponds 
dotting its surface are fed by never-failing springs. 
This one feature adds immeasurably to its value 
as an agricultural State. In Illinois, Iowa, and 
Nebraska the farmer is compelled to pump water 
for his stock, and in those States we see windmills 
erected for that purpose ; but here the ponds are 
so numerous and the springs so abundant that far 
less pumping will be required than in the other 
prairie States of the Union. 

We fall in with a Dutchman, where we camp for 
the night, who has taken up a hundred and sixty 
acres under the Pre-emption Act. He has put up 
a log-hut, turned a few acres of the sod, and is 
getting ready to live. His thrifty wife has a flock 
of hens, which supply us with fresh eggs. This 
pioneer has recently come from Montana. He had 
a beautiful farm in the Deer Lodcje Pass of the 
Eocky Mountains, within seven miles of the sum- 
mit. 

' " I raised as good wheat there as I can here," 
he says, — " thirty bushels to the acre." 

" Why did you leave it ? " 



126 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

" I could n't sell anytliing. There is no market 
there. The farmers raise so much that they can 
hardly give their grain away." 

" Did you sell your farm ? " 

" 1^0, I left it. It is there for anybody to take." 

"Is it cold there?" 

" No colder than it is here. We have a few cold 
days in winter, but not much snow. Cattle live 
in the fields through the winter, feeding on bunch- 
grass, which grows tall and is very sweet." 

Here was information worth having, — the ex- 
perience of a farmer. The Deer Lodge Pass is at 
the head- waters of the Missouri, in the main di- 
vide of the Eocky Mountains, and one of the sur- 
veyed lines of the Northern Pacific Eailroad passes 
through it. We have thought of it as a place 
where a railroad train would be frozen up and 
buried beneath descending avalanches ; but here is 
a man who has lived within seven miles of the top 
of the mountains, who raised the best of wheat, 
the mealiest of potatoes, whose cattle lived in the 
pastures through the winter, but who left his farm 
for the sole reason that he could not sell any- 
thing. Montana has no market except among the 
mining population, and the miners are scattered 
over a vast region. A few farmers in the vicinity 
of a mining-camp supply the wants of the place. 
Farming will not be remunerative till a railroad is 
com2:)leted up the valley of the Yellowstone or 



ROUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 127 

Missouri. What stronger argument can there be, 
what demonstration more forcible, for the imme- 
diate construction of the Northern Pacific Eail- 
road ? It will pass through the heart of the Ter- 
ritory which is yielding more gold and silver than 
any other Territory or State. 

This farmer says that Montana is destined to be 
a great stock-growing State. Cattle thrive on the 
bunch-grass. The hills are covered witli it, and 
millions of acres that cannot be readily cultivated 
will furnish pasturage for flocks and herds. This 
testimony accords with statements made by those 
who have visited the Territory, as well as by others 
who have resided there. 

We have met to-day a long train of wagons 
filled with emigrants, who have come from Wis- 
consin, Illinois, Indiana, and some from Ohio. 

Look at the wagons, each drawn by four oxen, — 
driven either by the owner or one of his barefoot 
boys. Boxes, barrels, chairs, tables, pots, and pans 
constitute the furniture. The grandmother, white- 
haired, old, and wrinkled, and the wife with an 
infant in her arms, with three or four romping 
children around her, all sitting on a feather-bed 
beneath the white canvas covering. A tin kettle 
is suspended beneath the axle, in which a tow- 
headed urchin, covered with dust, is swinging, 
clapping his hands, and playing with a yellow 
dog trotting behind the team. A hoop-skirt, a 



128 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

chicken-coop, a pig in a box, are the most conspic- 
uous objects that meet the eye as we look at 
the hinder part of the wagon. A barefooted boy, 
as bright-eyed as Whittier's ideal, — now done in 
chromo-lithograph, and adorning many a home, — 
marches behind, with his rosy-cheeked sister, driv- 
ing a cow and a calf. 

To-night they will be fifteen miles nearer their 
destination tlian they were in the morning. Some 
of the teams have been two months on the road, 
and a few more days will bring tliem to the spot 
which the emigrant has already selected for his 
future home. They halt by the roadside at night. 
The oxen crop the rich grasses ; the cow supplies the 
little ones with milk ; the children gather an arm- 
ful of sticks, the mother makes a cake, and bakes 
it before the camp-fire in a tin baker such as was 
found in every New England home forty years ago ; 
the emigrant smokes his pipe, rolls himself in a 
blanket, and snores upon the ground beneath the 
wagon, while his family sleep equally well beneath 
the canvas roof above him. Another cake in the 
morning, with a slice of fried pork, a drink of 
coffee, and they are ready for the new day. 

Not only along this road, but everpvhere, we 
may behold just such scenes. A great army of 
occupation is moving into the State. The advance 
is all along the line. Towns and villages are 
springing up as if by magic in every county. 



BOUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 129 

Every day adds thousands of acres to tliose al- 
ready under cultivation. The fields of this year are 
wider than they were a year ago, and twelve months 
hence will be much larger than they are to-day. 

In all new countries, no matter how fertile they 
may be, breadstuffs must be imported at the out- 
set. It was so when California was first settled ; 
but to-day California is sending her wheat all over 
the world. The first settlers of Minnesota were 
lumbermen, and up to 1857 there was not wheat 
enough produced in the State to supply their 
wants. The steamers ascending the Mississippi 
to St. Paul were loaded with flour, and the world 
at large somehow came to think of Minnesota as 
being so cold that wheat enough to supply the few 
lumbermen, employed in the^ forests and on the 
rivers could never be raised there. 

See how this region, which we all thought of as 
lying too near the north pole to be worth any- 
thing, has developed its resources ! In 1854 the 
number of acres under cultivation in the State 
was only fifteen thousand, or about two thirds of 
a single township. 

Fifteen years have passed by, and the tilled area 
is estimated at about two million acres ! In 1857 
she imported grain ; but her yield of wheat the 
present year is estimated at more than twenty mil- 
lion bushels ! 

I would not make the farmers of New England 

6* I 



130 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

discontented. I would not advise all to put up 
their farms at auction, or any well-to-do farmer 
of Massachusetts or Vermont to leave his old 
home and rush out here without first coming to 
survey the country; but if I were a young man 
selling corsets and hoop-skirts to simpering young 
ladies in a city store, I would give such a jump 
over the counter that my feet would touch ground 
in the centre of a great prairie ! 

I would have a homestead out here. True, there 
would be hard fare at first. The cabin would be 
of logs. There would be short commons for a year 
or two. But with my salt pork I would have 
pickerel, prairie chickens, moose, and deer. I 
should have calloused hands and the back-ache at 
times ; but my sleep would be sweet. I should 
have no theatre to visit nightly, no star actors to 
see, and should miss the tramp of the great multi- 
tude of the city, — the ever-hurrying throng. The 
first year might be lonely ; possibly, I should have 
the blues now and then ; but, possessing my soul 
with patience a twelvemonth, I should have neigh- 
bors. The railroad would come. The little log- 
hut would give place to a mansion. Eoses would 
bloom in the garden, and morning-glories open 
their blue bells by the doorway. The vast ex- 
panse would wave with golden grain. Thrift and 
plenty, and civilization with all its comforts and 
luxuries, would be mine. 



EOUND THE CAMP-FIRE. 131 

Are the colors of the picture too bright ? Ee- 
member that in 1849 Minnesota had less than five 
thousand inhabitants, and that to-day she has near- 
ly five hundred thousand. 

I am writing to young men who have the whole 
scope of life before them. You are a clerk in a 
store, with a salary of five hundred dollars, perhaps 
seven hundred. By stinting here and there you 
can just bring the year round. It is a long, long 
look ahead, and your briglitest day-dream of the 
future is not very bright. 

Now take a look in this direction. You can get 
a hundred and sixty acres of land for two hun- 
dred dollars. If you obtain it near a railroad, it 
will cost three hundred and twenty dollars. It 
will cost three dollars an acre to plougli the ground 
and prepare it for the first crop, besides the fen- 
cing. But the first crop, ordinarily, will more than 
pay the entire outlay for ground, fencing, and 
ploughing, rive years hence the land will be 
worth fifteen or twenty-five dollars per acre. This 
is no fancy sketch. It is simply a statement as 
to what has been the experience of thousands of 
people in Minnesota. 

Think of it, young men, you who are rubbmg 
along from year to year with no great hopes for 
the future. Can you hold a plough ? Can you drive 
a span of horses ? Can you accept for a while 
the solitude of nature, and have a few hard knocks 



132 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

for a year or two ? Can you lay aside paper col- 
lars and kid gloves, and wear a blue blouse and 
blister your hands with w^ork ? Can you possess 
your soul in patience, and hold on your way with 
a firm purpose ? If you can, there is a beautiful 
home for you out here. Prosperity, freedom, inde- 
pendence, manhood in its highest sense, peace of 
mind, and all the comforts and luxuries of life, 
are awaiting you. 

There is no medicine for a wearied mind or 
jaded body equal to life on the prairies. When 
our party left the East, every member of it was 
worn down by hard Avork. Some of us were dys- 
peptic, some nervous, while others had tired brains. 
It is the misfortune of Americans to be ever work- 
ing as if they were in the iron-mills, or as if the 
Philistines had them in the prison-house ! 

We have been a few weeks upon the frontier, 
— been beyond the reach of the daily newspaper, 
beyond care and trouble. The world has got on 
without us, and now we are on our way back, 
changed beings. We are as good as new, — tough, 
rugged, hale, hearty, and ready for a frolic here, 
or another battle with life when we reach home. 

Behold us at our halting-place for the night ; a 
clear stream near by winding through pleasant 
meadows, bordered by oaks and maples. The 
horses are unharnessed, and are rolling in the tall 
grass after their long day's work. The teamsters 



ROUND THE CAMP-FIKE. 133 

are pitching the tents, the cook is busy with his 
pots and kettles. Already we inhale the aroma 
steaming from the nose of the coffee-pot. The 
pork and fish and plover over the fire, like a mis- 
sionary or colporteur or Sunday-school teacher, 
are doing good 1 What odor more refreshing than 
that exhaled from a coffee-pot steaming over a 
camp-fire, after twelve hours in the saddle, — the 
fresh breeze fanning your cheeks, and every sense 
intensified by beholding the far-reaching fields 
blooming with flowers or waving with ripening 
gTain? 

The shadows of night are falling, and though the 
sun has shone through a cloudless sky the evening 
air is chilly. We will warm it by kindling a 
grand bivouac-fire, where, after supper, we will sit 
in solemn council, or crack jokes, or tell stories, as 
the whim of the hour shall lead us. 

There was a time when the gray-beards of our 
party were youngsters and played " horse " with a 
wooden bit between the teeth, the reins handled 
by a wliite-haired schoolmate. How we trot- 
ted, cantered, reared, pranced, backed, and then 
rushed furiously on, making the little old hand- 
cart rattle over the stones ! It was long ago, but 
we have not forgotten it, and to-night we will be 
boys once more. 

Yonder by the roadside lies a fallen oak, a mon- 
arch of the forest, broken down by the wind, — 



134 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

by the same tempest that levelled our tents. It 
shall blaze to-night. We will sit in its cheerful 
light. It would be ignoble to hack it to pieces and 
bring it into camp an armful at a time ; we will 
drag it bodily, lop off the limbs and pile them 
high upon the trunk, touch a match to the with- 
ered leaves, and warm the chiUy air. 

" All hands to the harness ! " It is a royal team. 
How could it be otherwise with the Ex-Governor 
of the Green Mountain State for leader, matched 
with our Judge, who, for sixteen years, honored 
the judiciary of Maine, with three members of 
Congress past and present, a doctor of divinity 
and another of medicine, — all in harness ? We 
have a strong cart-rope of the best Manilla hemp, 
which has served us many a turn in pulling our 
wagons through the sloughs, and which is brought 
once more into service. A few strokes of the axe 
provide us with levers which serve for yokes. We 
X^air off, two and two, and take our places in the 
team. 

" Are you all ready ? Xow for it ! " It is the 
voice of our leader. 

" Gee up ! Whoa ! Whoa I Hip ! Hurrah ! Now 
she goes ! " 

We shout and sing, and feel an ecstatic thrill 
running all over us, from the tips of our fingers 
down into our boots 1 

What a deal of power there is in a yell ! The 



EOUKD THE CAMP-riRE. 135 

teamster screams to liis horses ; the plough-boy 
makes himself hoarse by shouting to his oxen ; the 
fireman feels that he is doing good service when 
he goes tearing down the street yelling with all 
his might. He never would put out the fire if 
he could n't yell. A hurrah elected General Har- 
rison President of the United States, and it has 
won many a political battle-field. A hurrah starts 
the old oak from its bed. See the Executive as 
•he sets his compact shoulders to the work, mak- 
ing the lever bend before him. Notice the tall 
form of the Judge bowing in the traces ! If the 
rope does not break, the log is bound to come. 

The two are good at pulling. They have shown 
their power by dragging one of the greatest enter- 
prises of modern times over obstacles that would 
have discouraged men of weaker nerve. The pub- 
lic never will know of the hard work performed 
by them in starting the Northern Pacific Eailroad, 
— how they have raised it from obscurity, from 
obloquy, notwithstanding ojDposition and prejudice. 
The time will come when the public will look 
upon the enterprise in its true light. AVlien the 
road is opened from Lake Superior westward, when 
the traveller finds on every hand a country of 
surpassing richness, a climate in the Northwest as 
mild as tliat of Pennsylvania, when he sees the 
numberless attractions and exhaustless resources 
of the land, then, and not till then, will the labors 



136 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

of Governor Smith and his associates in carrying 
on this work be appreciated. 

To-night they enter with all the zest of youth 
into the project of building a camp-fire, and tug at 
the rope with the enthusiasm of boyhood. 

It is a strong team. Our doctor of divinity, 
whether in the pulpit or on the prairie, pulls with 
*'a forty parson power," to use Byron's simile. 
And our M. D., whether he has hold of a gnarled 
oak or the stump of a molar in the mouth of a 
pretty young lady, is certain to master it. 

A member of Congress "made believe pull," as 
we used to say in our boyhood, but complacently 
smoked his pipe the while ; the correspondent 
tipped a wink at the smoker, seized hold of a 
lever, shouted and yelled as if laying out all his 
strength, and pulled — about two pounds ! But 
we dragged it in amid the hurrahs of the team- 
sters, wiped the sweat from our brows, and then 
through the evening sat round the blazing log, and 
made the air ring with our merry laughter. So 
we rubbed out the growing wrinkles, smoothed the 
lines of care, and turned back the shadow creeping 
up the dial 




.'lit 



IN THE FOREST. 137 

CHAPTEE VII. 

IN THE FOREST. 

IN" preceding chapters the characteristics of the 
country west of the Mississippi have been 
3et forth ; but many a man seeking a new home 
would be lonely u]3on the prairies. The lumber- 
man of Maine, who was born in the forest, who 
in childhood listened to the sweet but mournful 
music of the ever-sighing pines, would be home- 
sick away from the grand old woods. The trees 
are his friends. The open country would be a soli- 
tude, but in the depths of the forest he would ever 
find congenial company. There the oaks, the elms, 
and maples reach out their arms lovingly above 
him, sheltering him alike from winter's blasts and 
summer's heats. Even though he may have no 
poetry in his soul, the woods will have a charm for 
him, for there he finds a harvest already gTown 
and waiting to be gathered, as truly as if it were so 
many acres of ripened wheat. 

It is not difficult to pick out the " Down-Easters " 
in Minnesota. When I hear a man talk about 
" stumpage " and " thousands of feet," I know that 
he is from the Moosehead region, or has been in 
a lumber camp on the Chesuncook. He has eaten 



138 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

pork and beans, and slept on hemlock boughs on 
the banks of the Madawaska. When he cocks his 
head on one side and squints up a pine-tree, I 
know that he has Blodget's Table in his brain, and 
can tell the exact amount of clear and merchant- 
able lumber wliich the tree will yield. His para- 
dise is in the forest, and there alone. 

The region east of the Mississippi and around 
its head-waters is the Eden of lumbermen. 

The traveller wdio starts from St. Paul and trav- 
els westward will find a prairie country ; but if he 
travels eastward, or toward the northeast, he will 
find himself in the woods, where tall, pines and 
spruces and oaks and maples rear their gigantic 
trunks. It is not all forest, for here and there we 
see " openings " where the sunlight falls on pleas- 
ant meadows ; but speaking in general terms, the 
entire country east of the Mississippi, in Minne- 
sota and northern Wisconsin, and in that portion 
of Michigan lying between Lake Superior and 
Lake Michigan, is the place for the lumberman. 

The soil is sandy, and the geologist will see 
satisfactory traces of the drift period, wdien a 
great flood of waters set southward, bringing gran- 
ite bowlders, pebbles, and stones from the country 
lying between Hudson Bay and Lake Superior. 

The forest growth affects the climate. There is 
more snow and rain east of the Mississi]3pi than 
west of it. The temperature in winter on Lake 



IN THE FOREST. 139 

Superior is milder than at St. Paul, but there is 
more moisture in the air. The climate at Duluth 
or Superior City during the winter does not vary 
much from that of Chicago. Notwithstanding the 
difference of latitude, the isothermal line of mean 
temperature for the year runs from the lower end 
of Lake Michigan to the western end of Lake 
Superior. Probably more snow falls in Minne- 
sota than around Chicago, for in all forest re- 
gions in northern latitudes there is usually a 
heavier rain and snow fall than in open coun- 
tries. The time will probably come when the 
rain-fall of eastern Minnesota and northern Mich- 
igan will be less than it is now. AAlien the lum- 
bermen have swept away the forests, the sun will 
dry up the moisture, there will be less rain east 
of the Mississippi, while the probabilities are 
that it will be increased westward over all the 
prairie region. Orchards, groves, corn - fields, 
wheat-fields, clover-lands, — all will appear with 
the advance of civilization. They will receive 
more moisture from the surrounding air than the 
prairie grasses do at the present time. Every- 
body knows that the hand of man is powerful 
enough to change climate, — to increase the rain- 
fall here, to diminish it there ; to lower the tem- 
perature, or to raise it. 

The Ohio Eiver is dwindling in size because the 
forests of Ohio and Pennsylvania are disappearing. 



140 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Palestine, Syria, and Greece, although they have 
supported dense populations, are barren to-day be- 
cause the trees have been cut down. If this 
were an essay on the power of man over nature, 
instead of the ^\Titing out of a few notes on the 
Northwest, I might go on and give abundant data ; 
but I aUude to it incidentally in connection with 
the climate, which fifty years hence will not in all 
probability be the same that it is to-day. 

Having in preceding pages taken a survey of the 
magnificent farming region beyond the ]\Iississippi, 
it remains for us to take a look at the country 
between the Mississippi and Lake Superior. 

Leaving our camp equipage and the horses that 
had borne us over the prairies, bidding good by to 
our many friends in Minneapolis and St. Paul, we 
started from the last-named city for a trip of a 
hundred and fifty miles through the woods. The 
first fifty miles was accomplished by rail, through 
a country partially settled. Upon the train were 
several ladies and gentlemen on their way to 
"White Bear Lake, not the White Bear of the 
West, but a lovely sheet of water ten miles north 
of St. Paul. It is but a few years since Wabashaw 
9,nd his dusky ancestors trolled their lines by day 
and speared pickerel and pike by torchlight at 
night upon its placid bosom, but now it is the 
favorite resort of picnic-j)arties from St. Paul. Here 
and there along the shores are low grass-grown 



IX Tin: FORE.:.T. 141 

monuments, raised by the Cliippewas when they 
were a powerful nation among the Eed Men. 

" But now the wheat is gi'eeii and high 
On clods that hid the warrior's breast, 
And scattered in the furrows lie 
The weapons of his rest." 

The lake is six miles long and dotted with isl- 
ands. It was a general gathering-place of the 
Indians, as it is now of the peo^^le of the sur- 
rounding country. Its curving shores and pebbly 
beaches, bordered by a magnificent forest, present 
a charming and peaceful picture. 

We are accompanied on our trip by the Pres- 
ident of the Lake Superior and Mississippi Eail- 
road, and other gentlemen connected with the 
railroads of the Northwest. At Wyoming we 
leave our friends, bid good by to the locomotive, 
and sav how do you do to a brio-ht new mud- 
wagon ! It is set on thorough - braces, with a 
canvas top. There are seats for nine inside and 
one with the driver outside. Carpet-bags and 
valises are stowed under the seats. We have no 
extra luggage, but are in light staging order. 

AVe are bound for Superior and Duluth. 

" You will have a sweet time getting there," is 
the remark of a mud-bespattered man sitting on 
a pile of lumber by the roadside. He has just 
come throuo'h on foot with a dozen men, who 
have thrown down the shovel to take up the 



142 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

sickle, or rather to foUow tlie reaper during har- 
vest. 

What he means by our having a sweet time we 
do not quite comprehend. 

" You wiU find the road baddish in spots," says 
another. 

A German, with bushy beard and uncombed 
hair, barefooted, and carrying his boots in his 
hands, exclaims, " It ish von tarn tirty travel all 
the time ! " 

We understand him. With a crack of the whip 
we roll away, our liorses on the trot, passing 
cleared fields, where cattle are up to their knees 
in clover, past wheat-fields ready for the reaper, 
reaching at noon our halting-place for dinner. 

Whenever you find a farm-house anywhere out 
West where there are delicious apple-pies, or any- 
thing especially nice in the pastry line, on the 
table, you may be pretty sure that the hostess 
came from Maine ; at least, such has been my expe- 
rience. I remember calhng at a house in central 
Missouri during the war, and, instead of having the 
standard dish of the Southwest "hog and hom- 
iny," obtaining a luxurious dinner, finishing off 
with apple-pie, the pastry moulded by fair hands 
that were trained to housework on the banks of 
the Penobscot. Last year I found a lady from 
Maine among the Sierra IsTevadas ; I was confi- 
dent that she was from the Pine -Tree State the 



IN THE FOREST. 143 

moment I saw her pies ; for somehow the daugh- 
ters of Down East have the knack of making 
pastry that wouki delight an epicure. And now 
in Minnesota we sit down to a substantial dinner 
topped off, rounded, and made complete by a 
piece of Maine apple-pie. 

The daughters of New Hampshire and of Ver- 
mont may possibly make just as good cooks, but 
it has so happened that Ave have fallen in with 
housewives from Elaine when our appetite was 
sharpened for something good. 

Our dinner is at the house of a farmer Avho 
came to Minnesota from the Kennebec. He knew 
how to swing an axe, and the oaks and maples 
have fallen before his sturdy strokes ; the j)lough 
and harrow and stump-puller have been at work, 
and now we look out upon wheat-fields and acres 
of waving corn, inhale the fragrance of white 
clover, and hear the humming of the bees. We 
see at a glance the capabilities of the forest region 
of ^linnesota. We understand it just as well as 
if we were to read all the works extant on soil, 
climatology, natural ]3roductions, etc. Here, as 
well as westward of the Mississippi, wheat, corn, 
potatoes, clover, and timothy can be successfully 
and profitably cultivated. 

" I raised thirty-five bushels of wheat to the acre 
last year, and I guess I shall have that this year," 
said the owner of the farm. 



144 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

This well-to-do farmer and his wife came here 
without capital, or rather with capital arms and 
strong hearts, to rear a home, and here it is : a 
neat farm-house of two stories ; a carpet on the 
floor, a sofa, a rocking-chair, pictures on the walls ; 
a large barn ; granary well filled, — a comfortable 
home with a bright future before them. 

When the timber has disappeared from eastern 
Minnesota, the land will produce luxuriantly. The 
country will not be settled quite as rapidly here as 
west of the IVIississippi ; but it is not to be forever 
a wilderness. The time will come when along 
every stream there w^ill be heard the buzzing of 
saws, the whirring of mill-stones, and the click 
and clatter of machinery. This vast area of tim- 
ber will invite every kind of manufacturing, and 
the same elements which have contributed so 
largely to build up the Eastern States — the man- 
ufacturing and industrial — will here aid in build- 
ing up one of the strongest communities of our 
future republic. 

Clearings here and there, cabins by the road- 
side, bark wigwams which have sheltered wander- 
ing Ojibwas, and a reacli of magnificent forest, are 
the features of the country tlirough which we ride 
this glorious afternoon, with the sunlight glimmer- 
ing among the trees, till suddenly we come upon 
Chengwatona. 

It is a small village on Snake Elver, with a 



IN THE FOREST. 145 

hotel, half a dozen houses, and a saw-mill where 
pine logs are going np an incline from the pond at 
one end, and coming out in the shape of bright 
new lumber at the other. 

The dam at Chengwatona has flooded an im- 
mense area, and lookinfy toward the descendinsj sun 
we behold a forest in decay. The trees are leafless, 
and the dead trunks rising from the water, robbed 
of all their beauty, present an indescribable scene 
of desolation when contrasted with the luxuriance 
of the living forest through which we have passed. 

With a fresh team we move on, finding mud 
" spots " now and then. We remember the re- 
marks of the felloAVS at the railroad. We dive into 
holes, the forward wheels going down herclmtg, send- 
ing bucketsful of muddy water upward to the roof 
of the wagon and forward upon the horses ; jounce 
over corduroy which sets our teeth to chattering ; 
then come upon a series of hollows through which 
we ride as in a jolly-boat on the waves of the sea. 
The wagon is ballasted by two members of Con- 
gress on the back seat, and by our rotund physi- 
cian and the Vice-President of the Northern Pa- 
cific on the middle seat. The President is out- 
side with the driver, on the lookout for breakers, 
while the rest of us, like passengers on shipboard, 
stowed beneath the hatches, must take whatever 
comes. The members of Congress bob up and 
do^^Tl like electric pith-balls between the negative 

7 J 



146 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

and positive poles of a galvanic battery, — only 
tliat the positive is the prevailing force ! When 
the for^Yard wheels go down to the hub, they go 
up ; and then, as they descend, the seat, by some 
unaccountable process, comes up, meets them half- 
way, — and with such a bump 1 

Then we who are shaking our sides with laugh- 
ter on the front seat, congratulating ourselves, like 
the Pharisees, that we are not as tliey are, suddenly 
find ourselves sprawling on the floor. When we 
regain our places, the M. D. and Vice-President 
come forward w^ith a rush and embrace us frater- 
nally. We get our legs so mixed up with our 
neighbors' that w^e can hardly tell whether our feet 
belong to ourselves or to somebody else ! The 
light weights of the party are knocked about like 
shuttlecocks, while the solid ones roll like those 
ridiculous, round-bottomed, grinning images that 
we see in the toy-shops ! I find myself going up 
and down after the manner of Sancho Panza when 
tossed in a blanket. 

Our dinners are well settled when we reach 
Grindstone, — our stopping-place for the night. 
The town is located on Grindstone Creek, and con- 
sists of a log-house and stable, surrounded by 
burnt timber. 

Half a dozen men who have footed it from 
Duluth are nursing their sore feet in one of the 
three rooms on the ground-floor. The furniture 



IN THE FOREST. 147 

of the apartment consists of a cast-iron stove in 
the centre and three rough benches against the 
walls, which are papered with pictorial newspa- 
pers. 

The occupants are discussing the future pros- 
pects of Duluth. 

" It is a right smart chance of a place/' says a 
tall, thin-faced, long-nosed man stretched in one 
corner. We know by the utterance of that one 
sentence that he is from southern Illinois. 

" They have got their ^-deas pretty well up 
though, on real estate, for a town that is only a 
yearlin'," says another, who, by his accent of the 
i, has shown that he too is a Western man. 

An Amazon in stature, with a round red face, 
hurries up a supper of pork and fried eggs ; and 
then we who are going northward, and they who 
are travelling; southward, — sixteen of us, all told, 
— creep up the narrow stairway to the unfinished 
garret, and go to bed, with our noses close to the 
rafters and long shingles, through the crevices of 
which we look out and behold the stars marching 
in grand procession across the midnight sky. 

It is glorious to lie there and feel the tire and 
weariness go out of us ; to look into the " eterni- 
ties of space," as Carlyle says of the vault of 
heaven. But our profound thoughts upon the 
measureless empyrean are brought down to sub- 
lunary things by four of the sleepers who engage 



148 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

in a snoring contest. The race is so close, neck 
and neck, or rather nose and nose, that it is im- 
possible to decide whether the deep sonorous — 
not to say snorous ? — bass of the big fellow by the 
window, or the sharp, piercing, energetic snorts 
of the thin-faced, lantern-jawed, long-nosed man 
from southern Illinois, is entitled to the trumpet 
or horn, or whatever may be appropriate to sig- 
nalize such championship. Either of them would 
have been a power in the grand chorus of the 
Coliseum Jubilee, and both together would be 
equal to the big organ ! 

We are off early in the morning, feeling a little 
sore in spots. The first thump extorts a sudden 
oh ! from a member of Congress, but we are philo- 
sophic, and accommodate ourselves to circum- 
stances, tell stories between the bumpings, and 
make the grand old forest ring with our laughter. 
It is glorious to get away from the town, and out 
into the woods, where you can shout and sing and 
let yourself out without regard to what folks will 
say! The fountain of perennial youth is in the 
forest, — never in the city. Its healing, beautify- 
ing, and restoring waters do not run through 
aqueducts; they are never pumped up; but you 
must lie down upon the mossy bank beneath old 
trees and drink from the crystal stream to obtain 
them. 

We quench our thirst from gurgling brooks, pick 



IN THE FOREST. 149 

berries by the roadside, walk ahead of the lum- 
bering stage, and enjoy the solitude of the inter- 
minable forest. 

Eighteen miles of travel brings us to Kettle 
Eiver Crossing, where we sit down to a dinner of 
bla.ckberries and milk, bread and butter, and black- 
berry-pie, in a clean little cottage, with pictures 
on the walls, books on a shelf, a snow-white cloth 
on the table, and a trim little woman waiting 
upon us. 

" May I ask where you are from ? " 

" Manchester, ISTew Hampsliire." 

It was Lord Morpeth or the Duke of Argyle, I 
have forgotten which, who said that 'New England 
looked as if it had just been taken out of a band- 
box ; so with this one-storied log-house and every- 
thing around it. We had sour-krout at Grind- 
stone, but have blackberries here ; and that is just 
the difference between Dutchland and N"ew Eng- 
land, whether you seek for them on the Atlantic 
slope or in the heart of the continent. 

Space is wanting to tell of all the incidents of 
a three days' forest ride, — how we trolled for 
pickerel on a little lake, seated in a birch-bark canoe, 
and hauled them in hand over hand, — bouncing 
fellows that furnished us a delicious breakfast ; 
how we laughed and told stories, never minding 
the bumping and thumping of the wagon, and 
came out strong, like Mark Tapley, every one of 



150 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

US ; how we gazed upon the towering pines and 
sturdy oaks, and beheld the gloom settling over 
nature when the great eclipse occurred ; and how, 
just as night was coming on, we entered Supe- 
rior, and saw a horned owl sitting on the ridge- 
pole of a deserted house in the outskirts of the 
town, surveying the desolate scene in the twilight, 
— looking out upon the cemetery, the tenantless 
houses, and the blinking lights in the windows. 

Superior has been, and still is, a city of the Fu- 
ture, rather than of the Present. It was laid out 
before the war on a magnificent scale by a party 
of Southerners, among whom was John C. Breck- 
enridge, who is still a large owner in corner lots. 

It has a fine situation at the southwestern cor- 
ner of the lake, on a broad, level plateau, with a 
densely timbered country behind it. The St. Louis 
Eiver, wliich rises in northern Minnesota, and 
which comes tumbling over a series of cascades 
formed by the high land between Lake Superior 
and the Mississippi, spreads itself out into a shal- 
low bay in front of the town, and reaches the lake 
over a sand-bar. 

Government has been erecting breakwaters to 
control the current of the river, with the expecta- 
tion of deepeniug the channel, which has about 
nine feet of water ; but thus far the improvements 
have not accomplished the desired end. The bar 
is a great impediment to navigation, and its exist- 



IN THE FOREST. 151 

ence has liad a blighting effect on the once fair 
prospects of Superior City. Dredges are employed 
to deepen the channel, but those thus far used are 
small, and not much has been accomplished. The 
citizens of Superior are confident that with a lib- 
eral appropriation from government the channel 
can be deepened, and that, when once cleared out, 
it can be kept clear at a small expense. 

Superior has suffered severely from the reaction 
which followed the flush times in 1857. A large 
amount of money was expended in improvements, 
— grading streets, opening roads, building piers, 
and erecting houses. Then the war came on, and 
all industry was paralyzed. The Southern pro- 
prietors were in rebellion. The growth of the 
place, which had been considerable, came to a sud- 
den stand-still. 

The situation of the town, while it is fortunate 
in some respects, is unfortunate in others. It is 
in Wisconsin, while the point which reaches across 
the head of the lake is in Minnesota. The last- 
named State wanted a port on the lake in its own 
dominion, and so Duluth has sprung into exist- 
ence as the rival of its older neiohbor. 

o 

The St. Paul and Superior Eailroad, having its 
terminus at Duluth, lies wholly witliin the State 
of Minnesota, and comes just near enough to Su- 
perior to tantalize and vex tlie good people of that 
place. 



152 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

But the citizens of that town have good pluck. 
I do not know what motto they have adopted for 
their great corporate seal, but Nil Desperanchcm 
would best set forth their hopefulness and deter- 
mination. They are confident that Superior is yet 
to be the queen city of the lake, and are deter- 
mined to have railway communication with the 
Mississippi by building a branch line to the St. 
Paul and Superior Eoad. 

Our party is kindly and hospitably entertained 
by the people of the place, and to those who think 
of the town as being so far northwest that it is be- 
yond civilization, I have only to say that there are 
few drawing-rooms in the East where more agree- 
able company can be found than that which we 
find in one of the parlors of Superior ; few places 
where the sonatas of Beethoven and Mendelssohn 
can be more exquisitely rendered upon the piano- 
forte, by a lady who bakes her own bread and 
cares for her family without the aid of a servant. 

It is the glory of our civilization that it adapts 
itself to all the circumstances of life. I have no 
doubt that if Minnie, or Winnie, or Georgiana, or 
almost any of the pale, attenuated young ladies 
who are now frittering away their time in study- 
ing the last style of paniers, or thrumming the 
piano, or reading the last vapid novel, were to have 
their lot cast in the West, — on the frontiers of 
civilization, — where they would be compelled to do 



IN THE FOREST. 153 

something for themselves or those around them, 
that they would manfully and wolnanfidly accept 
the situation, be far happier than they now are, 
and worth more to themselves and to the world. 

I dare say that nine out of every ten young men 
selling dry-goods in retail stores in Boston and 
elsewhere have high hopes for the future. They 
are going to do something by and by. AVlien they 
get on a little farther they will show us what they 
can accomplish. But the chances are tliat they 
will never get that little farther on. The tide is 
against them. One thing we are liable to forget ; 
we measure ourselves by what we are going to do, 
whereas the world estimates us by what we have 
already done. How any young man of spirit can 
settle himself down to earning a bare existence, 
when all this vast region of the N"ortliwest, with 
its boundless undeveloped resources before him, is 
inviting him on, is one of the unexplained mys- 
teries of life. They will be Nobodies where they 
are ; they can be Somebodies in building up a new 
society. The young man who has measured off 
ribbon several years, as thousands have who are 
doing no better to-day than they did five years 
ago, in all probability will be no farther along, ex- 
cept in years, five years hence than he is now. 



7* 



154 THE SEAT OF EMPIEE. 

CHAPTEE YIII. 

DULUTH. 

EMBAEKING at a pier, and steering north- 
west, we pass up the bay, with the long, 
narrow, natural breakwater, Minnesota Point, on 
our right hand, and the level plateau of the 
main-land, with a heavy forest growth, on our left. 
Before us, on the sloping hillside of the northern 
shore, lies the rapidly rising to^^ai of Duluth, un- 
heard of twelve months ago, but now, to use a 
Western term, " a right smart chance of a place." 

One hundred and ninety years ago Duluth, a 
French explorer, was coasting along these shores, 
and sailing up this bay over which we are gliding. 
He was the first European to reach the head of the 
lake. He crossed the country to the Upper Mis- 
sissippi, descended it to St. Paul, where he met 
Eather Hennipen, who had been held in captivity 
by the Indians. 

It is suitable that so intrepid an explorer should 
be held in remembrance, and the founders of the 
new town have done wisely in naming it for him, 
instead of calling it Washington or Jackson, or 
adding another " ville " to the thousands now so 
perplexing to post-ofi&ce clerks. 



BULUTH. 155 

The new city of the Northwest is sheltered 
from northerly winds by the high lands behind it. 
The St. Louis Eiver, a stream as large as the Mer- 
rimac, after its turbulent course down the rocky 
rapids, with a descent altogether of five hundred 
feet, flows peacefully past the town into the Bay 
of Superior. The river and lake together have 
thrown up the long and narrow strip of land 
called Minnesota Point, reaching nearly across the 
head of the lake, and behind which lies the bay. 
It is as if the Titans had thrown up a wide rail- 
way embankment, or had tried their hand at filling 
up the lake. Tlie bay is shallow, but the men who 
projected the city of Duluth are in no wise daunted 
by that fact. Tliey have planned to make a harbor 
by building a mole out into the lake fifteen hun- 
dred or two thousand feet. It is to extend from 
tlie northern sliore far enough to give good an- 
chorage and protection to vessels and steamers. 

Tlie work to be done is in many respects similar 
to what has been accomplished at both ends of the 
Suez Canal. When M. Lesseps set about the con- 
struction of that magnificent enterprise, he found 
no harbor on the Mediterranean side, but only a low 
sandy shore, against which the waves, driven by 
the prevailing western winds, were always break- 
ing. 

The shore was a narrow strip of sand, behind 
which. lay a shallow lagoon called Lake Menzaleh. 



156 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

There was no granite or solid material of any de- 
scription at hand for the construction of a break- 
water. Undaunted by the difficulties, he com- 
menced the manufacture of blocks of stone on the 
beach, mixing hydraulic lime brought from France 
with the sand of the shore, and moistening it 
with salt water. He erected powerful hydraulic 
presses and worked them by steam. After the 
blocks, which weighed twenty tons each, had dried 
three months, they were taken out on barges and 
tumbled into the ocean in the line of the moles, one 
of which was 8,178 feet, nearly a mile and a half, 
in length ; the other 5,000 feet, enclosing an area 
of about five hundred acres. More than 100,000 
blocks of manufactured stone were required to 
comjDlete these two walls. They were not laid in 
cement, for it has been found that a rubble wall is 
better than finished masonry to resist the action 
of the waves. Having completed the walls, 
dredges were set to work, and the area has been 
deepened enough to enable the largest vessels 
navigating the Mediterranean to find safe anchor- 
age. 

These breakwaters were required for the outer 
harbor, but an inner basin was needed. To obtain 
it, M. Lesseps cut a channel through the low ridge 
of sand to Lake Menzaleh, where the water upon 
an average was four feet deep. A large area has 
been dredged in the lake, and docks constructed. 



DULUTH. 157 

and now the commerce of the world between the 
Orient and the Occident passes thi'ough the basin 
of Port Said. 

The Suez Canal, the construction of a large 
harbor on the sand-beach of the Mediterranean, 
and another of equal capacity on the Eed Sea, is 
one of the wonders of modern times, — a triumph 
of ensrineerincf skill and of the indomitable will 
of one energetic man. 

The people of Duluth will not be under the ne- 
cessity of manufacturing the material for the break- 
water, for along the northern shore there is an 
abundant supply of granite Avhich can be easily 
quarried. It is proposed to make an inner harbor 
by digging a canal across Minnesota Point and 
excavating the shallows. 

The difficulties to be overcome at Duluth bear 
slight comparison with those already surmounted 
on the Mediterranean. The commercial men of 
Chicago contemplate the fencing in of a few hun- 
dred acres of Lake Michigan; and there is no 
reason to doubt that a like thing can be done at 
the western end of Lake Superior. 

Two years ago Duluth was a forest ; but in this 
month of May, 1870, it has two thousand inhab- 
itants, with the prospect of doubling its population 
within a twelvemonth. The woodman's axe is 
ringing on the hills, and the trees are falling be- 
neath his sturdy strokes. From morning till night 



158 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

we hear the joiner's plane and the click of the 
mason's trowel. You may find excellent accom- 
modation in a large hotel, erected at a cost of forty 
thousand dollars. "We may purchase the products 
of all climes in the stores, — sugar from the West 
Indies, coffee from Java, tea from China, or silks 
from the looms of France. 

The printing-press is here issuing the Duluth 
Minnesotian, a sprightly sheet that looks sharply 
after the interests of this growing town. 

Musical as the ripples upon the pehhly shore of 
the lake are the voices of the children reciting 
their lessons in yonder school-house. I am borne 
back to boyhood days, — to the old school-house, 
with its hard benches, where I studied, played, 
caught flies, was cheated swapping jack-knives, and 
got a licking besides ' Glorious days they were 
for all that ! 

Presbyterian and Episcopal churches are already 
organized, also an Historical Society. During the 
last winter a course of lectures was sustained. 

The stumps are yet to be seen in the streets, 
but such is the beginning of a town which may 
yet become one of the great commercial cities of 
tlie interior. 

A meteorological record kept at Superior since 
1855 shows that the average period of navigation 
has been two hundred and sixteen days, which is 
fully as long as the season at Chicago. 







DULUTH. 






15 


Year. 


Opening. 




Close. 




No. of Days. 


1855 


April 


15 


December 


6 


235 


1856 


u 


16 


November 22 


220 


1857 


May 


27 




li 


20 


177 


1858 


March 20 




a 


22 


247 


1859 


May 


25 




u 


9 


164 


1860 


April 


7 


December 


4 


238 


1861 


June 


12 




li. 


12 


184 


1862 


April 


28 




u 


16 


233 


1863 


May 


10 




(( 


7 


212 


1864 


April 


23 




li. 


1 


222 


1865 


u 


22 




ii 


5 


227 


1866 


May 


5 




a 


10 


220 


1867 


April 


19 




a 


1 


225 



Steaming up the river several miles to tlie foot 
of the first rapids, and landing on tlie northern 
shore, climbing up a wet and slippery bank of red 
clay we are on the line of the railroad, upon which 
several hundred men are em^Dloyed. 

Grades of fifty feet to the mile are necessary 
from the lake up to the falls of the St. Louis, but 
the tonnage of the road will be largely eastward, 
down the grade, instead of westward. 

The road will • be about a hundred and forty 
miles in length, connecting the lake with the net- 
work of railroads centring at St. Paul. It is 
liberally endowed, having in all 1,630,000 acres 
of land heavily timbered with pine, butternut, 
white oak, sugar-maple, ash, and other woods. 

There is no doubt that this line of road will do 
an immense amount of business. Such is the 



160 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

estimation in which it is held by the moneyed men 
of Philadelphia, that Mr. Jay Cooke obtained the 
entire amount of money necessary to construct it 
in four days ! The bonds, I believe, were not put 
upon the market in the usual manner, by adver- 
tising, but were taken at once by men who wanted 
them for iuA^estment. 

A single glance at the map must be sufficient to 
convince any intelligent observer of the value of 
such a franchise. The wheat of Minnesota, to 
reach Chicago now, must be taken by steamers to 
La Crosse or Prairie du Chien, and thence trans- 
ported by rail across Wisconsin, but when this 
road is put in operation, the products of Minne- 
sota, gathered at St. Paul or Minneapolis, will seek 
this new outlet. 

Think of the scene of activity there will be 
along the line, not only of this road, but of the 
^Northern Pacific, when the two are completed to 
the lake, of an almost continuous train of cars, of 
elevators pouring grain from cars to ships and 
steamers. Think of the fleet that will soon whiten 
this great inland sea, bearing the products of the 
immense wheat-field eastward to the Atlantic 
cities, and bringing back the industries of the 
Eastern States ! 

It is only when I sit down to think of the future, 
to measure it by the advancement already made, 
that I can comprehend anything of the coming 



DULUTH. 161 

greatness of the Northwest, -- 20,000,000 bush- 
els of wheat this year; 500,000 inhabitants in the 
State, yet scarcely a hundredth part of the area un- 
der cultivation. A^^lat will be the product ten years 
hence, when the population will reach 1,500,000 ? 
What will it be twenty years hence ? How shall 
we obtain any conception of the business to be 
done on these railways when Dakota, Montana, 
Washington, and Oregon, and all the vast region of 
the Assinniboine and the Saskatchawan, pour their 
products to the nearest water-carriage eastward? 
We are already beyond our depth, and are utterly 
unable to comprehend the probable development. 

The men who are building this railroad from St. 
Paul to Duluth have not failed to recognize this 
one fact, that by water Duluth is as near as Chi- 
cago to the Atlantic cities. AA^ieat and flour can 
be transported as cheaply from Duluth to Buffalo 
or Ogdensburg as from the southern end of Lake 
Michigan, while the distance from St. Paul to Lake 
Superior is only one hundred and forty miles 
against four hundred and eighty to Chicago. We 
may conclude that the wheat of Minnesota can be 
carried fifteen or twenty cents a bushel cheaper 
by Duluth than by Lake Michigan, — a saving to 
the Eastern consumer of almost a dollar on each 
barrel of flour. Twenty cents on a bushel saved 
will add at least four dollars to the yearly product 
of an acre of land. 



162 THE SEAT OF EMPIEE. 

The difference in freight on articles manufac- 
tured in the East and shipped to ]\Iinnesota will 
be still more marked, for grain in bulk is taken at 
low rates, while manufactured goods pay first-class. 
The completion of this railway will be a great 
blessing to the people of New England and of all 
the East, as well as to those of the Northwest. 
Anything that abridges distance and cheapens car- 
riage is so much absolute gain. I do not think 
that there is any public enterprise in the country 
that promises to produce more important results 
than the opening of this railway. 

An elevator company has been organized by 
several gentlemen in Boston and Philadelphia, and 
the necessary buildings are now going up. The 
wdieat will be taken directly from the cars into 
the elevator, and discharged into the fleet of pro- 
pellers running to Cleveland, Buffalo, and Og- 
densburg, already arranged for this Lake Superior 
trade. 

The region around the western end of the Lake 
has resources for the develo23ment of a varied in- 
dustry. The wooded section extends from Central 
Wisconsin westward to the Leaf Hills beyond the 
Mississippi, and northward to Lake Winnipeg. 
This is to be the lumbering region of the North- 
west, for the manufacture of all agricultural im- 
plements, — reapers, mowers, harvesters, ploughs, 
drills, seed-sowers, wagons, carriages, carts, and fur- 



DULUTH. 163 

niture, — "besides furnishing lumber for fencing, for 
railroad and building purposes. 

Upon tlie St. Louis Eiver there is exhaustless 
water-power, — a descent of five hundred feet, 
with a stream always pouring an abundant flood. 
Its source is among the lakes of northern Minne- 
sota, which, being filled to overflowing by the rains 
of spring and early summer, become great reser- 
voirs. With such a supply of water there is no 
locality more favorably situated^ for the manufac- 
ture of every variety of domestic articles. Un- 
doubtedly the water-power will be largely employed 
for flouring-mills. The climate is admirably adapt- 
ed to the grinding of grain. The falls being so 
near the lake, there will be cheap transportation 
eastward to Buffalo, Cleveland, Philadelphia, New 
York, and Boston, while westward are the prairies, 
easily reached by the railroads. 

The geological formation on the north side of 
Lake Superior is granite, but as we follow up the 
St. Louis Eiver we come upon a ridge of slate. It 
forms the backbone of the divide between the lake 
and the Mississippi Eiver. 

A quarry has been opened from which slates of 
a quality not inferior to those of Vermont are ob- 
tained, and so far as we know it is the only quarry 
in the Northwest. It is almost invaluable, for 
Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, western Minnesota, and 
Dakota have very little wood. Shingles are costly. 



164 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

but here is abundant material to cover the roofs 
of the millions of houses that are yet to rise upon 
the prairies. 

This slate formation is thus referred to by- 
Thomas Clark, State Geologist, in his Eeport to the 
Governor of Minnesota, dated December, 1864 
(pp. 29, 30): — 

" These slates are found in all degrees of charac- 
ter, from the common indurated argillaceous fissile 
to the highly metamorphosed and even trappous 
type. The working of these slates demands the 
attention of builders ; their real value is economi- 
cally of more importance to the prairie and sparsely 
timbered vg^lley of the Mississippi than any other 
deposit in the State's possession on the lake. The 
annual draught of hundreds of millions of lumber 
upon the pine forests of the St. Croix and Upper 
Mississippi and tributaries will exhaust those re- 
gions before the close of this century. The trustees 
of our young Commonwealth are emphatically ad- 
monished to encourage and foster the working of 
these slates, and to bring them into use at the 
earliest time possible. A hundred square feet of 
dressed slates at the quarries of Vermont, 'New 
York, and Canada are worth from one and a half 
to two dollars ; the weight ranges from four to six 
hundred pounds, or about four squares to the ton. 
A ton of this roofing may be transported from the 
St. Louis quarry to the Mississippi, by railway, at 



DULUTH. 165 

three dollars, and thence by river to the landings as 
far down as St. Louis or Cairo ; but the article 
may be at all points in this State accessible by 
boats or railway, at an average cost of fifteen 
dollars per ton, or, at most, four dollars per square, 
— little, if any, more than pine shingles ; the 
former as good for a century as the latter is for a 
decade. The supply of these cliffs is literally in- 
exhaustible ; if one fourth of this slate area in the 
St. Louis Valley proves available, — and doubtless 
one half will, — it will yield one thousand millions 
of tons. 

" The demand for this slate at ten roofs to the 
square mile, and for forty thousand square miles, 
would be one million of tons, or one thousandth 
part of the material. The annual demand for slates 
in the Mississippi Valley may be reasonably esti- 
mated at one hundred thousand tons, an exportable 
product of two hundred thousand dollars, besides 
the element of a permanent income to the railways 
and water-craft of the State of a half-million of 
dollars annually." 

To-day the country along the St. Louis is a wil- 
derness. Climb the hills, and look upoii, the scene, 
and think of the coming years. 

"Thou shalt look 
Upon the green and rolling forest tops, 
And down into the secrets of the glens 
And streams, that Avith their bordering thickets strive 
To hide their Avindings. Thou shalt gaze at once. 



166 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Here on white villages, and tilth and herds, 
And swarming roads, and there on solitudes 
That only hear the torrent, and the wind, 
And eagle's shriek." 

Here, through the bygone centuries, the Indians 
have set their nets and hooks without ever dream- 
ing of laying their hands upon the v^^ealth that 
Nature has ever in store for those who will labor 
for it. 

A few of the original lords of the forests are 
here, and they are the only idlers of this region. 
They lounge in the streets, squat in groups under 
the lee of buildings, and pick animated somethings 
from their hair ! 

Their chief appears in an old army coat with 
three stars on each shoulder, indicating that he 
ranks as a lieutenant-general among his people. 
He walks with dignity, although his old black 
stove-pipe hat is badly squashed. The warriors 
follow him, wrapped in blankets, with eagle feath- 
ers stuck into their long black hair, and are as 
dignified as the cl^ief. Labor! not they. Pale- 
faces and squaws may work, they never. Squaw- 
power is their highest conception of a labor-saving 
machine. They have fished in the leaping torrent, 
l)ut never thought of its being a giant that might 
be put to work for their benefit. 

It is evident that a great manufacturing industry 
must spring up in this region. At Minneapolis, 
St. Cloud, and here on the St. Louis, we find the 



DULUTH. 167 

three principal water-powers of the Northwest. 
The towTi of Thomj^son, named in honor of one 
of the proprietors, Mr. Edgar A. Thompson of 
Philadelphia, has been laid out at the falls, and be- 
ing situated on the line of the railroad, and so 
convenient to the lake, will probably have a rapid 
growth. The St. Paul and Mississippi Ptailroad, 
which winds up the northern bank of the river, 
crosses the stream at that point, and strikes south- 
ward throudi the forests to St. Paul. 

o 

The road, in addition to its grant of land, has re- 
ceived from the city of St. Paul $ 200,000 in city 
bonds, and this county of St. Louis at the head of 
the lake has given S 150,000 in county bonds. 

The lands of this company are generally heavily 
timbered, — with pine, maple, ash, oak, and other 
woods. 

The white pines of this region are almost as 
magnificent as those that formerly were the glory 
of jNIaine and New Hampshire. Norway pines 
abound. Besides transporting the lumber from its 
own extensive tracts and the lands of the govern- 
ment adjoining, it will be the thoroughfare for an 
immense territory drained by the Snake, Kettle, 
St. Louis, and St. Croix Eivers. 

The lands that bear such masjnificent forest- 
trees are excellent for agriculture. Nowhere in 
the East have I ever seen ranker timothy and clo- 
ver than we saw on our journey from St. Paul. 



168 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

The company offer favorable terms to all set- 
tlers. Men from Maine and New Hampshire are 
already locating along the line, and setting up 
saw-mills. They w^ere lumbermen in the East, 
and they prefer to follow the same business in the 
West, rather than to speed the plough for a living. 
I doubt not that the chances for making money 
are quite as good in the timbered region as on 
the prairies, for the lumber will pay for the land 
several times over, which, when put into grain or 
grass, yields enormously. 



THE MINING REGION. 169 



CHAPTEE IX. 

THE MINING REGION. 

THE sun was throwing his morning beams upon 
the tree-tops of the Apostle Islands, as our 
little steamer, chartered for the occasion at Superior, 
rounded the promontory of the main-land, turned 
its prow southward, and glided into the harbor of 
Bayfield, on the southern shore of the lake. 

We had made the passage from Superior City 
during the night, and were on deck at daybreak to 
see the beauties of the islands, of which so much 
has been written by explorers and tourists. The 
scenery is not bold, but beautiful. Perhaps there 
is no place on the lake where more charming vistas 
open to the eye, or where there is such a succes- 
sion of entrancing views. 

The islands, eighteen in number, lie north of 
the promontory. They would appear as high hills, 
with rounded summits, crowned with a dense for- 
est growth, if the waters were drained off; for all 
around, between the islands and the mainland, are 
deep soundings. There is no harbor on the Atlan- 
tic coast, none in the world, more accessible than 
Bayfield, or more securely land-locked. It may 
be approached during the wildest storm, no matter 

8 



170 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

which way the wind is blowing. When the north- 
easters raise a sea as terrible as that which some- 
times breaks upon ^Nahant, the captains of steamers 
and schooners on Lake Superior run for the Apos- 
tle Islands. 

Bayfield is about sixty miles from Superior City, 
and is the first harbor Avhere vessels can find shelter 
east of the head of the lake. The Apostle Islands 
seem to have been dumped into the lake for the 
benefit of the mighty tide of commerce which in 
the coming years is to float upon this inland sea. 

" It is," said our captain, " the only first-class 
harbor on the lake. It can be approached in all 
weathers ; the shores are bold, the water deep, the 
anchorage excellent, and the ice leaves it almost 
two weeks earlier in spring than the other harbors 
at the head of the lake." 

The town of Bayfield is named for an officer of 
the Eoyal Engineers, who was employed years 
ago in surveying the lake. His work was well 
done, and till recently his charts have been relied 
on by the sailing-masters ; but the surveys of the 
United States Engineers, now approacliing com- 
pletion, are morg minute and accurate. 

The few houses that make up the town are beau- 
tifully located, on the western side of the bay. 
Madeline Island, the largest of the group, lies im- 
mediately in front, and shelters the harbor and 
town from the northeast storms. 



THE MINING REGION. 171 

The scream of the steamer's whistle rings sharply 
on the morning air, — while main-land and island, 
harbor and forest, repeat its echoes. It wakes up 
all the braves, squaws, and pappooses in the wig- 
wams and log-houses of the Chippewa reservation, 
and all the inhabitants of Bayfield. The sun is just 
making his appearance when we run alongside the 
pier. It is an early hour for a dozen strangers, 
with sharp-set appetites, to make a morning call, — 
more than that, to drop in thus unceremoniously 
upon a private citizen for breakfast. 

Tliere being no hotel in the place, we are put to 
this strait. Possibly old Nokomis, who is cook- 
ing breakfast in a little iron pot with a big piece 
knocked out of its rim, who squats on the ground 
and picks out the most savory morsels with her 
fingers, would share her meal with us, but she 
does not invite us to breakfast, nor do we care to 
make ourselves at home in the wigwam. 

But there is rare hospitality awaiting us. A 
gentleman who lives in a large white house in the 
centre of the town, Captain Vaughn, though not 
through with his morning nap when we steam up 
the harbor, is wide awake in an instant. 

I wonder if there is another housewife in the 
United States who would provide such an ample 
repast as that which, in an incredibly short space 
of time, appeared on the table, prepared by IMrs. 
Vaughn, — such a tender steak, mealy potatoes. 



172 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

nice biscuit, delicious coffee, berries and sweet 
milk ; a table-cloth as white as the driven snow ; 
and the hostess the picture of health, presiding at 
the table with charming ease and grace, not at all 
disturbed by such an avalaijche of company at 
such an hour ! 

^Vhere the breakfast came from, or who cooked 
it so quickly, is an unexplained mystery; and 
then there was a basketful of lunch put up by 
somebody for us to devour while coasting about 
the bay, and the hostess the while found time to 
talk with us, to sit down to the parlor organ and 
charm us with music. So much for a Bayfield 
lady, born in Ohio, of stanch Yankee stock. 

Embarking on Captain Vaughn's little steam- 
yacht, we go dancing along the shores, now run- 
ning near the bluffs to examine the sandstone for- 
mation like that of the Hudson, or looking up to 
the tall pines waving their dark green plumes, or 
beholding the lumbermen felling the old monarchs 
and dragging them with stout teams to the Bay- 
field saw-mills. A run of about fifteen miles 
brings us to the city of Ashland, situated at the 
head of the bay. It makes quite an imposing ap- 
pearance when you are several miles distant, and 
upon landing you find that you have been imposed 
upon. Somebody came here years ago, laid out a 
town, surveyed the lots, cut out magnificent ave- 
nues through the forest, found men who believed 



THE MINING EEGION. 173 

that Asliland was to be a great city, who bonght 
lots and built houses ; but the crowd did not 
come ; the few who came soon turned their backs 
upon the place, leaving all their improvements. 
One German family remains. Two pigs were in 
possession of a parlor in one deserted house, and a 
cow quietly chewing her cud in another. 

A mile east of Ashland is Bay City, another 
place planned by speculators, but which probably 
might be purchased at a discount. 

The country around Bayfield is in a primitive 
condition now, but the time is rapidly approaching 
for a change. By and by this will be a great resort 
for tourists and seekers after health. Nature has 
made it for a sanitarium. No mineral springs 
have been discovered warranted to cure all dis- 
eases, but nowhere in this Northwest has nature 
compounded purer air, distilled sweeter water, or 
painted lovelier landscapes. The time will come 
when the people of Chicago, Milwaukie, and other 
Western cities, seeking rest and recreation during 
the summer months, will flee to this harbor of re- 
pose. The fish are as numerous here, and as eager 
to bite the hook, as anywhere else on the lake, 
while the streams of the main-land abound with 
trout. By and by this old red sandstone will be 
transformed into elegant mansions overlooking the 
blue waters, and it w^ould not be strange if com- 
merce reared a great mart around this harbor. 



174 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

The charter of the ISTorthern Pacific Eailroad ex- 
tends to this point, and as the road would pass 
through heavily timbered lands, the company will 
find it for their interest to open the line, as it will 
also form a connecting link between the West and 
the iron region of Lake Superior. 

But whether a city rises here, whether a rail- 
road is constructed or not, let me say to any one 
who wants to pull out big trout that this is the 
place. 

An Indian who has been trying his luck shows 
a string of five-pounders, caught in one of the 
small streams entering the bay. There is no sport 
like trout-fishing. Think of stealing on tiptoe 
along the winding stream, dropping your hook into 
the gurgling waters, and feeling a moment later 
something tugging, tu.rning, pulling, twisting, run- 
ning, now to the right, now to the left, up stream, 
down stream, making the thin cord spin, till your 
heart leaps into your throat through fear of its 
breaking, — fear giving place to hope, hope to 
triumph, when at length you land a seven-pounder 
on the green and mossy bank 1 You find such 
trout in the streams that empty into the lake 
opposite the Apostle Islands, — trout mottled with 
crimson and gold ! 

Bidding good by to our generous host and host- 
ess we take an eastward-bound steamer in the 
evening for a trip down the lake, stopping for an 



THE MINING EEGION. 175 

hour or two at Ontonagon, then steaming on, 
rounding Keweenaw Point during the night, and 
reaching Marquette in the morning. 

Fishing-boats are dancing on the waves, yachts 
scudding along the shore, tourists rambling over 
the rocks at our right hand, throwing their lines, 
pulling up big trout, steamers and schooners ate 
lying in the harbor, and thrift, activity, and enter- 
prise is everwhere visible. 

We see an immense structure, resembling a rail- 
way bridge, built out into the harbor. It is several 
hundred feet in length, and twenty or more in 
height. A train of cars comes thundering down a 
grade, and out upon the bridge, while men run- 
ning from car to car knock out here and there a 
bolt or lift a catch, and we hear a rumbling and 
thundering, and feel the wharf tremble beneath 
our feet. It is not an earthquake ; they are only 
unloading iron ore from the cars into bins. 

A man by means of machinery raises a trap- 
door, and the black mass, starting with a rush, 
thunders once more as it plunges into the hold of 
a schooner. It requires but a few minutes to take 
in a cargo. And then, shaking out her sails, the 
schooner shapes her course eastward along the 
" Pictured Eocks " for the St. Mary's Canal, bound 
for Cleveland, Erie, or Chicago with her freight of 
crude ore to be smelted and rolled where coal is 
near at hand. 



176 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

The town is well laid out. Although the busi- 
ness portion was destroyed by fire not many 
months ago, it has been rebuilt. There are 
elegant residences, churches, school - houses, and 
stores. Men walk the streets as if they had a 
little more business on hand than they could well 
attend to. 

The men who used to frequent this region to 
trade with the Indians knew as early as 1830 that 
iron existed in the hills. But it was not till 1845, 
just a quarter of a century ago, that any attempt 
was made to test the ore. Dr. Jackson, of Boston, 
w^ho visited Lake Superior in 1844, pronounced it 
of excellent quality. He informed Mr. Lyman 
Pray, of Charlestown, Mass., of its existence, and 
that the Indians reported a '' mountain " of it not 
far from Marquette. Mr. Pray at once started on 
an exploring expedition, reached Lake Superior, 
obtained an Indian guide, penetrated the forest, 
and found the hills filled with ore. 

About the same time a gentleman named Ev- 
erett obtained half a ton of it, which the Indians 
and half-breeds carried on their backs to the 
Carp Eiver, and transported it to the lake in 
canoes. 

It was smelted, but was so different from that 
of Pennsylvania that the iron-masters shook their 
heads. Some declared that it was of no particular 
value, others that it could not be worked. 



THE MINING REGION. 177 

The Pittsburg iron-men pronounced it worth- 
less. But Mr. Everett persevered, sent a small 
quantity to the Coldwater forge, where it was 
smelted and rolled into a bar, from which he made 
a knife-blade, and was convinced that the metal 
was superior in quality to any other deposit in the 
country. 

The Jackson Company was at once formed for 
mining in the iron and copper region. The cop- 
per fever was at its height, and the company was 
organized with a view of working both metals 
if thought advisable. A forge was erected on 
the Carp Eiver in 1847, making four blooms a 
day, each about four feet long and eight inclies 
thick. 

Another was built, in 1854, by a company from 
Worcester, Mass., but so small was the produc- 
tion that in 1856 the shipment only reached five 
thousand tons. The superior qualities of the 
metal began to be known. Other companies were 
formed and improvements made ; raih^oads and 
docks were constructed, and the production has 
had a steady increase, till it has reached a high 
figure. 

There are fourteen companies engaged in min- 
ing, — two have just commenced, while the otliers 
are well developed. TJie production of tlie twelve 
principal mines for the year 1868 wiU be seen from 
the following figures : — 

8* I* 



178 



THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 



Jackson, 
Cleveland, 
Marquette, 
Lake Superior, . 
New York, 
Lake Angeline, 
Edwards, 
Iron Mountain, 
Washington, 
New England, . 
Champion, 
Barnum, 



Total, 



Tons. 

131,707 

102,213 

7,977 

105,745 

45,665 

27,651 

17,360 

3,836 

35,757 

8,257 

6,255 

14,380 

606,803 



The increase over the previous year is between 
forty and fifty thousand tons. The yield for 1869 
was about 650,000 tons. The entire production 
of all the mines up to the close of 1868 is 2,300,000 
tons. 

Iron mining in this region is in its infancy ; 
and yet the value of the metal produced last year 
amounts to eighteen inilliorb dollars. 

The cause for this rapid development is found 
in the fact that the Lake Suj)erior ore makes the 
best iron in the world. Persistent efforts were 
made to cry it down, but those who were engaged 
in its production invited rigid tests. 

Its tenacity, in comparison with other quali- 
ties, will be seen by the following tabular state- 
ment : — 



THE MINING REGION, 179 

Swedish, 69 

English Cable bolt. 59 

Eussian. 76 

Lake Superior, . ' 89^ 

When this fact was made known, railroad com- 
panies began to use Lake Sujjerior iron for the 
construction of locomotives, car- wheels, and axles. 
Boiler builders wanted it. Those who tried it 
Avere eager to obtain more, and the result is seen 
in the rapidly increasing demand. 

The average cost of mining and delivering the 
ore in cars at the mines is estimated at about 
S2 per ton. It is shipped to Cleveland at a 
cost of $ 4.35, making $ 6.35 wdien laid on the 
dock in that city, where it is readily sold for $ 8, 
leaving a profit of about $ 1.65 per ton for the 
shipper. Perhaps, including insurance and inci- 
dentals, the profit may be reduced to about $ 1.25 
per ton. It will be seen that this is a very remu- 
nerative operation. 

About one hundred furnaces in Ohio and Penn- 
sylvania use Lake Superior ore almost exclusively, 
while others mix it with the ores of those re- 
gions. 

A large amount is smelted at Lake Superior, 
where charcoal is used. The forests in the vicinity 
of the mines are rapidly disappearing. The wide- 
spreading sugar-maple, the hardy yellow birch, the 
feathery hackmatack ai^d evergreen hemlock are 



180 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

alike tumbled into the coal-pit to supply fuel for 
the demands of commerce. 

The charcoal consumed per ton in smelting costs 
about eleven cents per bushel. For reducing a 
ton of the best ore about a hundred and ten 
bushels are required; for a ton of the poorest 
about a hundred and forty bushels, giving an 
average of $ 13 per ton. The cost of mining is, 
as has already been stated, about $ 2 per ton. To 
this must be added furnace-labor, interest on cap- 
ital employed, insurance, freight, commission, mak- 
ing the total cost about S 35 a ton. As the iron 
commands the highest price in the market, it will 
be seen that the iron companies of Lake Superior 
are having an enormous income. 

Some men who purchased land at government 
price are on the high road to fortune. One man 
entered eighty acres of land, which now nets him 
tioenty-foiir thousand dollars per annum ! 

A railroad runs due west from Marquette, gain- 
ing by steep gradients the general level of the 
ridge between Superior and Michigan. It is called 
the Marquette and Ontonagon Railroad, and will 
soon form an important link in the great iron high- 
way across the continent. It is about twenty 
miles from Marquette to the principal mmes, which 
are also reached by rail from Escanaba, on Green 
Bay, a distance of about seventy miles. 

The ore is generally found in hills ranging from 



THE MINING REGION. 181 

one to five hundred feet above tlie level of the 
surrounding country. The elevations can hardly 
be called mountains ; they are knolls rather. They 
are iron warts on Dame Nature's face. They are 
partially covered with earth, — the slow-forming 
deposits of the alluvial period. 

There are five varieties of ore. The most valua- 
ble is what is called the specular hematite, which 
chemically is knowai as a pure anhydrous sesqui- 
oxide. This ore yields about sixty-five per cent 
of pure iron. It is sometimes found in conjunc- 
tion with red quartz, and is then known as mixed 
ore. 

The next in importance is a soft hematite, re- 
sembling the ores of Pennsylvania and Connecticut. 
It is quite porous, is more easily reduced than any 
other variety, and yields about fifty per cent of 
pure iron. 

The magnetic ores are found farther west than 
those already described. The Michigan, Washing- 
ton, Champion, and Edwards mines are all mag- 
netic. Sometimes the magnetic and specular lie 
side by side, and it is a puzzle to geologists and 
chemists alike to account for the difference be- 
tween them. As yet we are not able to under- 
stand by what subtle alchemy the change has been 
produced. 

Another variety is called the silicious hematite, 
which is more difficult of reduction than the 



182 THE SEAT OF EMPIEE. 

others. It varies in richness, and there is an un- 
limited supply. 

The iifth variety is a silicious hematite found 
with manc^anese, which, when mixed with other 
ores, produces an excellent quality of iron. Very 
little of this ore has been mined as yet, and its 
relative value is not ascertained. 

The best iron cannot be manufactured from one 
variety, but by mixing ores strength and ductility 
both are obtained. England sends to Eussia and 
Sweden for magnetic ores to mix with those pro- 
duced in Lancashire, for the manufacture of steel. 
The fires of Sheffield would soon go out if the 
manufactures in that town -were dependent on 
English ore alone. The iron-masters there could 
not make steel good enough for a blacksmith's 
use, to say nothing of that needed for cutlery, if 
they were cut off" from foreign magnetic ores. 

Here, at Lake Superior, those necessary for the 
production of the best of steel lie side by side. 
A mixture of the hematite and magnetic gives a 
metal superior, in every respect, to any that Eng- 
land can produce. 

This one fact settles the question of the future of 
this region. It is to become one of the great iron- 
marts of the world. It is to give, by and by, the 
supremacy to America in the production of steel. 

It is already settled, by trial, that every grade 
of iron now in use in arts and manufactures can 



THE MINING REGION. 183 

be produced here at Lake Superior by mixing the 
various ores. 

The miners are a hardy set of men, rough, -an- 
couth, but enterprising. They live in small cot- 
tages, make excellent wages, drink whiskey, and 
rear large families. How happens it that in all 
new communities there is such an abundance of 
children ? They throng every doorway, and by 
every house we see them tumbling in the dirt. 
I^early every woman has a child in her arms. 

We cannot expect to see the refinements and 
luxuries of old communities in a country where 
the stumj)s have not yet been cleared from the 
streets, and where the spruces and hemlocks are 
still waving above the cottages of the settlers, 
but here are the elements of society. These hard- 
handed men are developing this region, earning a 
livelihood for themselves and enriching those who 
employ them. Towns are springing into exist- 
ence. We find Ishpeming rising out of a swamp. 
Imagine a spruce forest standing in a bog where 
the trees are so thick that there is hardly room 
enough for the lumbermen to swing 'their axes, the 
swamp being a stagnant pool of dark-colored water 
covered with green slime 1 

An enterprising town-builder purchased this bog 
for a song, and has laid out a city. Here it is, 
— dwelling-houses and stores standing on posts 
driven into the mud, or resting on the stumps. 



184 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

He has filled up the streets with the ddhris from 
the mines. Frogs croak beneath the dwellings, or 
sun themselves on the sills. The town is not thus 
growing from the swamp because there is no solid 
land, but because the upland has exhaustless beds 
of iron ore beneath, too valuable to be devoted to 
building purposes. 

I have seen few localities so full of promise for 
the future, not this one little spot in the vicinity 
of Marquette, but the entire metallic region be- 
tween Lake Superior and Lake Michigan. 

Look at the locality ! It is half- way across the 
continent. Lake Michigan laves the southern, 
Superior the northern sliore, while the St. Law- 
rence furnishes water-carriage to the Atlantic. 
A hundred and fifty miles of rail from Bayfield 
will give connection with the navigable waters of 
the Mississippi. Through this peninsula will yet 
lie the shortest route between the Atlantic and 
Pacific. Westward are the wheat-fields of the 
continent, to be peopled by an industrious and 
thriving community. There is no point more cen- 
tral than this for easy transportation. 

Here, just where the future millions can be 
easiest served, exhaustless deposits of the best ore 
in the world have been placed by a Divine hand 
for the use and welfare of the mighty race now 
beginning to put forth its energies on this western 
hemisphere. 



THE MINING EEGION. 185 

TowTis, cities, and villages are to arise amid these 
hills ; the forests and the hills themselves are to 
disappear. The product, now worth seventeen mil- 
lions of dollars per annum, erelong will be valued 
at a hundred millions. 

I tliink of the coming years when this place 
will be musical with the hum of machinery ; when 
the stillness of the summer day and the crisp air 
of winter will be broken by the songs of men at 
work amid flaming forges, or at tlie ringing anvil. 
From Marquette, and Bayfield, and Ontonagon, 
and Escanaba, from every harbor on these in- 
land seas, steamers and schooners, brigs and ships, 
will depart freighted with ore; hither they will 
come, bringing the products of ^:he farm and work- 
shop. Heavily loaded trains will thunder over 
railroads, carrying to every quarter of our vast 
domain the metals manufactured from the mines 
of Lake Superior. 

"We have but to think of the capabilities of this 
region, its extent and area, the increase of popula- 
tion, the development of resources, the construc- 
tion of railways, the growth of cities and towns ; 
we have only to grasp the probabilities of the fu- 
ture, to discern the dawning commercial greatness 
of this section of our country. 



186 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

CHAPTEE X. 

A FAMILIAR TALK. 

" T HAVE called to have a little talk about the 

i- West, and think that I should like a farm in 
Minnesota or in the Eed Eiver country/' said a 
gentleman not long since, who introduced himself 
as Mr. Blotter, and who said he was " clerking it." 

" I want to go out West and raise stock," said 
another gentleman who stopped me on the street. 

" Where would you advise a fellow to go who 
has n't much money, but who is n't afraid to work ? " 
said a stout young man from Maine. 

" I am a machinist, and want to try my luck 
out West," said another young man hailing from 
a manufacturing town in Massachusetts. 

" I am manufacturing chairs, and want to know 
if there is a place out West where I can build up 
a good business," said another. 

Many other gentlemen, either in person or by 
letter, have asked for specific information. 

It is not to be expected that I can point out the 
exact locality suited to each individual, or with 
which they would be suited, but for the benefit 
of all concerned I give the substance of an eve- 
ning's talk with Mr. Blotter. 



FAMILIAR TALK. 187 

" I want a farm, I am tired of tlie city/' said he. 

Well, sir, you can be accommodated. The 
United States government has several million 
acres of land, — at least 30,000,000 in Minnesota, 
to say nothing of Dakota and the region beyond, 
— and you can help yourself to a farm out of any 
unoccupied territory. The Homestead Law of 1862 
gives a hundred and sixty acres, free of cost, to 
actual settlers, whether foreign -or native, male or 
female, over twenty-one years old, or to minors 
having served fourteen days in the army. For- 
eigners must declare their intention to become 
citizens. Under the present Pre-emption Law 
settlors often live on their claims many years 
before they are called on to pay the $1.25 per 
acre, — the land in the mean time having risen to 
$ 10 or $ 12 per acre. A recent decision gives 
single women the right to pre-empt. Live years' 
residence on the land is required by the Home- 
stead Law, and it is not liable to any debts con- 
tracted before the issuing of the patent. 

The State of Minnesota has a liberal law relative 
to the exemption of real estate from execution. 
A homestead of eighty acres, or one lot and house, 
is exempt ; also, live hundred dollars' worth of 
furniture, besides tools, bed and bedding, sewing- 
machine, three cows, ten hogs, twenty sheep, a 
span of horses, or one horse and one yoke of oxen, 
twelve months' provisions for family and stock, one 



188 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

wagon, two ploughs, tools of a mechanic, library of 
a professional man, five hundred dollars' worth of 
stock if a trader, and various other articles. 

You will find several railroad companies ready 
to sell you eighty, or a hundred and sixty, or 
six hundred and forty acres in a body, at reason- 
able rates, giving you accommodating terms. 

" Would you take a homestead from government, 
or would you buy lands along the line of a rail- 
road?" 

That is for you to say. If you take a homestead 
it will necessarily be beyond the ten-mile limit of 
the land granted to the road, where the advance 
in value will not keep pace with lands neare:^the 
line. You will find government lands near some 
of the railroads, which you can purchase for $ 2.50 
per acre, cash down. The railroad companies 
will charge you from S 2 to 8 10, according to 
location, but will give you time for payment. 

" What are their terms ? " 

The St. Paul and Pacific Eailroad, the main line 
of which is to be completed to the Eed Pdver this 
year, and which owns the branch line running from 
St. Paul up the east bank of the Mississippi to St. 
Cloud, have a million acres of prairie, meadow, 
and timber lands which they will sell in tracts of 
forty acres or more, and make the terms easy. Sup- 
pose you were to buy eighty acres at S 8 per acre, 
that would give you a snug farm for $640. If 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 



189 



you can pay cash down, they will make it $ 7 per 
acre, — $ 80 saved at the outset ; but if you have 
only a few dollars in your pocket they will let you 
pay a year's interest at seven per cent to begin 
with, and the principal and interest in ten annual 
payments. The figures would then run in this 
way: — 



j^igiii/y av^i 


CO au fip u uci < 


X»^i.C, ^ 


KJ-£\J. 




Interest. 


Principal. 


Total. 


1st year, . 


. $ 44.80 






2d " . 


. 40.32 . 


. $ 64.00 . . 


$ 104.32 


3d " . 


. 35.84 . 


. 64.00 . . 


99.84 


4th '' . 


. 31.36 . 


. 64.00 . . 


95.36 


5th " . 


. 26.88 . 


. 64.00 . . 


90.88 


6th " . 


. 22.40 . 


. 64.00 . . 


86.40 


7th " . . 


. 17.92 . 


. 64.00 . . 


81.92 


8th " . 


. 13.44 . 


. 64.00 . . 


77.44 


9th " . 


. 8.96 . 


. 64.00 . . 


72.96 


10th '' 


. 4.48 . 


. 64.00 . . 


68.48 


11th " . 





. 64.00 . . 


64.00 



" The second year will be the hardest," said Mr. 
Blotter, " for I shall have to fence my farm, build 
a cabin, and purchase stock and tools. Is there 
fencing material near ? " 

That depends upon where you locate. If you 
are near the line of the railway, you can have it 
brought by cars. If you locate near the " Big 
Woods " on the main line west of Minneapolis, 
you will have timber near at hand. Numerous 
saw-mills are being erected, some driven by water 



190 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

and others by steam. The timlDerecl lands of the 
company are already held at high rates, — from $ 7 
to $10 per acre. The country beyond the "Big 
Woods" is all prairie, with no timber except a few 
trees along the streams. It is filling up so rapidly 
with settlers that wood-lands are in great demand, 
for when cleared they are jnst as valuable as the 
prairie for farming purposes. 

Many settlers who took up homesteads before 
the railroad was surveyed now find themselves in 
good circumstances, especially if they are near a 
station. In many places near towns, land which 
a year ago could have been had for S2.50 per acre 
is worth $ 20 to-day. 

" Is the land in the Mississippi Valley above St. 
Paul any better than that of the prairies ? " 

Perhaps you have a mistaken idea in regard to 
the Mississip23i Valley. There are no bottom-lands 
on the Upper Mississippi. The prairie borders upon 
the river. You will find the land on the east side 
better adapted to grazing than for raising wheat. 
The company do not hold their lands along the 
branch at so high a figure as on the main line. 
Some of my Minnesota friends say that stock-grow- 
ing on the light lands east of the Mississippi is 
quite as profitable as raising wheat. Cattle, sheep, 
and horses transport themselves to market, but you 
must draw your grain. 

If you are going into stock-raising, you can af- 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 191 

ford to be at a greater distance from a railroad sta- 
tion than the man who raises wheat. It would un- 
doubtedly be for the interest of the company to sell 
you their outlying lands along the branch line at a 
low figure, for it would enhance the value of those 
nearer the road. You will find St. Cloud and Ano- 
ka thriving places, which, with St. Paul and Min- 
neapolis, will give a good home demand for beef 
and mutton, to say nothing of the facilities for 
reaching Eastern markets by the railroads and lakes. 

" Do the people of Minnesota use fertilizers ? " 

No ; they allow the manure to accumulate 
around their stables, or else dump it into the river 
to get rid of it ! 

They sow wheat on the same field year after 
year, and return nothing to the ground. They 
even burn the straw, and there can be but one 
result coming from such a process, — exhaustion 
of the soil, — poor, worn-out farms by and by. 

The farmers of the West are cruel towards 
Mother Earth. She freely bestows her riches, and 
then, not satisfied with her gifts, they plunder her. 
Men everywhere are shouting for an eight-hour 
law ; they must have rest, time for recreation and 
improvement of body and mind ; but they give the 
soil no time for recuperation. Men expect to be 
paid for their labors, but they make no payment 
to the kind mother who feeds them; they make 
her work and live on nothing. Farming, as now 



192 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

carried on in the West and Northwest, is down- 
right robbery and plunder, and nothing else. If 
the present exhaustive system is kept up, the time 
will come when the wheat-fields of Minnesota, in- 
stead of producing twenty-five bushels to the acre 
upon an average throughout the State, will not 
yield ten, which is the product in Ohio ; and yet, 
with a systematic rotation of crops and ajDplication 
of fertilizers, the present marvellous richness of 
the soil can be maintained forever. 

" Do the tame grasses flourish ? " 

Splendidly ; I never saw finer fields of timothy 
than along the line of the St. Paul and Pacific 
Eailroad, west of Minneapolis. White clover 
seems to spring up of its own accord. I remem- 
ber that I saw it growing luxuriantly along a path- 
way in the Eed Eiver Valley, and by the side of 
the military road leading through the woods to 
Lake Superior. Hay is very abundant, and ex- 
ceedingly cheap in Minnesota. I doubt if there 
is a State in the Union that has a greater breadtli 
of first-class grass-lands. Hon. Thomas Clarke, 
Assistant State Geologist, estimates the area of 
meadow-lands between the St. Croix and the Mis- 
sissippi, and south of Sandy Lake, at a million 
acres. He says : " Some of these are very exten- 
sive, and bear a luxuriant growth of grass, often 
five or six feet in height. It is coarse, but sweet, 
and is said to make excellent hay." 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 193 

I passed through some of those meadows, and 
can speak from personal observation. I saw many- 
acres that would yield two tons to the acre. The 
grasses are native, flat-leaved, foul-meadow and 
blue-joint, just such as I used to swing a scythe 
through years ago in a meadow in New Hamp- 
shire which furnished a fair quality of hay. The 
time will come when those lands will be valuable, 
although they are not held very high at present. 
A few years ago the Kankakee swamps in Illinois 
and Indiana were valueless, but now they yield 
many thousand tons of hay, and are rising in the 
market. 

" How about fruit ? I don't want to go where 
I cannot raise fruit." 

Those native to the soil are strawberries, rasp- 
berries, blackberries, gooseberries, huckleberries, 
cherries, and plums. I picked all of these upon 
the prairies and along the streams while there. 
The wild plum is very abundant, and in the fall 
of the year you will see thousands of bushels in 
the markets at St. Paul and Minneapolis. They 
make an excellent sauce or preserve. 

Minnesota may be called the Cranberry State. 
Many farmers make more money from their cran- 
berry-meadows than from their wheat-fields. The 
marshes in the northern section of the State are 
covered with vines, and the lands along the St. 
Croix yield abundantly. 



194 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Mr. Clarke, the geologist, says : " There are 
256,000 acres of cranberry-marsh in the triangle 
between the St. Croix and Mississippi, and bound- 
ed north by the St. Louis and Prairie Eivers ! The 
high price paid for this delicious fruit makes its 
cultivation very profitable in Minnesota, as well 
as in ]^ew Jersey and on Cape Cod." 

" Can apples be raised ? I am fond of them, 
and should consider it a drawback if I could not 
have an apple-orchard," said the persistent Mr. 
Blotter. 

I understand that till within a year or two the 
prospect for apples was not very encouraging. The 
first orchards were from Illinois nurseries, and it 
was not till native stocks were started that suc- 
cess attended the fruit-growers' efforts ; but now 
they have orchards as thrifty and bountiful as any 
in the country. At the last State Fair held at 
Eochester, one fruit-grower had fifty bushels on 
exhibition, and two hundred more at home. It 
was estimated that the yield in AVinona County 
last year was thirty thousand bushels.* 

The St. Paul Press, noticing the display of fruits 
at the Piamsay and Hennipen County Fair, says : 
" These two fairs have set at rest the long-mooted 

* These and many other facts relating to Minnesota are ob- 
tained from "Minnesota as it is in 1870," by J. W. McClung, 
of St, Paul, — an exceedingly valuable work, crammed with in- 
formation. 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 195 

question, whether IMinnesota is an apple-gi'owing 
State. Over two hundred varieties of the apple, 
exclusive of the crab species, were exhibited at 
Minneapolis, and a large number at St. Paul, of 
the finest development and flavor, and this fact 
will give an immense impetus to fruit-growing in 
our State." 

The followinfy varieties were exhibited at the 
last meeting of the Fruit-Growers' Association, of 
Winona County : The Duchess of Oldenburg, lit- 
ter's Large, Early Eed, Sweet June, Perry Eus- 
set. Pall Stripe, Keswick Codlin, Eed Astracan, 
Plum Cider, Phoenix, Wagner, Ben Davis, German 
Bough, Carolina Eed June, Bailey Sweet, St. 
Lawrence, Sops of Wine, Seek-no-further, Famuse, 
Price Sweet, Pomme Grise, TomjDkins County 
King, Northern Spy, Golden Eusset, Sweet Pear, 
Yellow Ingestrie, Yellow Bellflower, Lady Finger, 
Eaule's Jannet, Kirkbridge White, Janiton, Dume- 
low. Winter Wine Sap, Chronicle, FaE Wine Sap, 
Eosseau, Colvert, Benoni, Eed Eomanite. 

Many of the above are raised in E'ew England, 
so that those people who may cut loose from the 
East need not be apprehensive that they are bid- 
ding good by forever to the favorite fruits that 
have been a comfort as well as a luxury in their 
former homes. 

" I take it that grapes do not grow there ; it 
must be too far north," said my visitor. 



196 



THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 



On the contrary, tliey are indigenous. You find 
wild grapes along the streams, and in the gardens 
aroimd St. Paul and Minneapolis you will see 
many of the cultivated varieties bearing magnifi- 
cent clusters on the luxuriant vines. 

" How about corn, rye, oats, and other grains ; 
can they be raised with profit ? " 

The following figures, taken from the official re- 
port made to the last legislature of the products 
for 1869, will show the capabilities of the soil : — 







Average per 


Wheat, . 


18,500,000 bushels, . 


. m 


Com, . 


6,125,000 '' . 


35 


Oats, 


11,816,400 " . 


. 43 


Potatoes, . 


2,745,000 " . 


90 


Barley, . 


625,000 " . 


. 30.6 


Rye, . . 


58,000 " . 


18 


Buckwheat, 


. 28,000 " . 


. 16 


Hay, . . 


. 430,000 tons, . 


2.08 


Wool, . 


390,000 pounds. 




Butter, 


5,600,000 " 




Cheese, . 


145,000 " 




Sorghum, . 


80,000 gallons syrup. 




:^aple Sugar, . 


300,000 pounds. 




Flax, . 


. 170,000 " 





From this it would seem that the State is des- 
tined to be one of the most productive in the 
Union. 

" Have they good schools out there ? " 
Just as good as in New England. Two sections 
of land are set aside for the common-school fund. 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 197 

The entire amount of school lands in the State 
will be three milHon acres. 

These are sold at the rate of five dollars per 
acre, and the money invested in State or govern- 
ment bonds. Governor Marshall, in his last mes- 
sage, estimated the sum ultimately to be derived 
from the lands at sixteen million dollars. A 
school tax of two mills on the dollar is levied, 
which, with the interest from the fund, gives a 
liberal amount for education. 

"At what season of the year ought a man to 
go West ? " 

That depends very much upon what you intend 
to do. If you are going to farming, and intend to 
settle upon the prairies, you must be there in 
season to break up your ground in July. If the 
sod is turned when the grass is full of juices, it 
decays quickly, and your gTound will be in good 
condition for next year's ploughing. If you go into 
the timbered lands along the Lake Superior and 
Mississippi Eailroad, or along that of the North- 
ern Pacific, you can go any time ; but men having 
families will do well to go in advance and select 
their future home, and make some preparations 
before cutting loose from the old one. 

'' AVliich is the best way to go ? " 

You will find either of the great trunk rail- 
roads leading westward comfortable routes, and 
their rates of fare do not greatly vary. 



198 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

" Do you think that the State will have a rapid 
development ? " 

If the past is any criterion for the future, its 
growth will be unparalleled. Twenty years only 
have passed since it was organized as a Territory. 
The population in 1850 was 5,330; in 1860 it was 
172,022 ; in 1865, by the State census, 250,099. 
The census of 1870 will give more than half a 
million. The tide of emigration is stronger at the 
present time than it ever has been before, and 
the construction of the various railroads, the lib- 
eral policy of the State, its munificent school- 
fund, the richness of the lands, the abundance of 
pure, fresh water, the delightful climate, the situ- 
ation of the State in connection with the trans- 
continental line of railway, altogether will give 
Minnesota rapid advancement. Of the IsTorth- 
west as of a pumpkin-vine during the hot days 
and warm nights of midsummer, we may say that 
we can almost see it grow ! Look at the increase 
of wealth as represented by real and personal es- 
tates : — 

1850 .... $806,437 

1855 10,424,157 

1860 .... 36,753,408 

1865 45,127,318 

1868 .... 75,795,366 

From the report of the Assistant Secretary of 
State made to the Legislature in January, 1870, 
we have the following facts : — 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 199 

Total tilled acres, 1,690,000 

Value of real estate, .... $ 120,000,000 

'' " personal property, . . . 65,000,000 

" " livestock, .... 15,561,887 

'' " agricultural productions, . . 25,000,000 

" " annual manufactures, . . 11,000,000 

Amount of school-fund, .... 2,371,199 

Not only is Minnesota to have a rapid develop- 
ment, but Dakota as well. Civilization is advan- 
cing np the Missouri. Emigrants are moving on 
through Yankton and taking possession of the 
rich lands of that section, and the present year 
will see the more northern tide pouring into the 
Red River Valley, which Professor Hind called 
the Paradise of the Northwest. 

" How much will it cost me to reach Minnesota, 
and get started on a farm ? " 

The fare from Boston to St. Paul will be from 
$35 to $ 40. If you go into the timbered regions, 
you will have lumber enough near at hand to 
build your house, and it will take a great many 
sturdy strokes to get rid of the oaks and pines. 
If you go upon the prairies, you will have to ob- 
tain lumber from a distance. The prices at Minne- 
apolis are all the way from S 12 to $ 45 per thou- 
sand, according to quality. Shingles cost from 
$3.50 to S 4.50. 

Most of the farmers begin with a very small 
house, containing two or three rooms. They do 
not start with much furniture. We who are ac- 



200 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

customed to hot and cold water, batli-room, and 
all the modern conveniences of houses in the 
city, might think it rather hard at first to use a 
tin wash-basin on a bench out-doors, and ladies 
might find it rather awkward to go np to their 
chamber on a ladder ; but we can accommodate 
ourselves to almost anything, especially when we 
are working towards independence. Settlers start 
with small houses, for a good deal of lumber is 
required for fencing. A fence around forty acres 
requires 1,700 rails, 550 posts, and a keg of large 
nails. The farmers do not dig holes, but sharpen 
the lower ends of the posts and drive them down 
with a beetle. Two men by this process will fence 
in forty acres in a very short time. Such fences 
are for temporary use, but will stand for several 
years, — till the settler has made headway enough 
to replace them Avith others more substantial. 
You will want horses and oxen. A span of good 
farm horses will cost ^ 250 ; a yoke of good oxen, 
$ 125. Cows are worth from S 20 to $ 50. 

Carpenters, masons, and mechanics command 
high prices, — from $ 2 to S 4.50 per day. Farm 
laborers can be liired for $ 20 to S 25 per month. 

" What section of the ISTorthwest is advancing 
most rapidly ? " 

The southern half of Minnesota. As yet there 
are no settlements in the northern counties. Draw 
a line from Duluth to Fort Abercrombie, and 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 201 

you will have almost the entire population south 
of that line. A few families are living in Otter- 
Tail County, north of that line, and there are a 
few more in the Eed Eiver Valley. 

Two years hence there will probably be many 
thousand inhabitants in the northern counties ; 
the fertility of the Eed Eiver lands and the 
construction of two raiboads cannot fail of at- 
tracting settlers in that direction. There is far 
more first quality of agricultural land now held 
by government in the northwestern counties than 
in any other section of the State. The land-office 
for that region is at Alexandria in Douglas County. 
The vacant land subject to pre-emption as per 
share in the eleven counties composing the dis- 
trict amounts to 10,359,000 acres, nearly the same 
area as Massachusetts and N'ew Hampsliire to- 
gether. Take a glance at the counties. 

Douglas. — Four years ago it did not contain a 
single inhabitant, but now it has a population 
of about 5,000 ! The county has an area of twenty 
townships, 460,000 acres, and about 250,000 are 
still held by government. 

Grant — It lies west of Douglas. We passed 
through it on our way to the Eed Eiver. The main 
line of the St. Paul and Pacific Eailroad will run 
through the southwestern township this year. 
There are 295,000 acres stiU vacant. 

Otter- TaAl. — We travelled through this county 



202 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

on our return from Dakota, and were serenaded by 
the Germans in our camp on the bank of Eiish 
Lake. It contains 1,288,000 acres, of which 
850,000 are held by government. This county 
is abundantly supplied with timber, — pine as 
well as oak, and other of the hard woods. There 
are numerous lakes and ponds, and several fine 
mill-sites. The soil is excellent. The lakes abound 
with whitefish. In 1868 the population was 800. 
N'ow it may be set down at 2,000. 

Wilkin. — This county is on the Eed Eiver. 
It was once called Andy Johnson, but now bears 
the name of Wilkin. There you may take your 
choice of 650,000 acres of fertile lands. You can 
find timber on the streams, or you may float it 
down from Otter-Tail. The St. Paul and Pacific 
Eailroad will be constructed through the county 
during the year 1870. 

Clay. — North of Wilkin on the Eed Eiver is 
Clay County, containing 650,000 acres of govern- 
ment land, all open to settlement. The Northern 
Pacific Eailroad will probably strike the Eed Eiver 
somewhere in this county. The distance from 
Duluth will be two hundred and twenty-five miles, 
and the settler there will be as near market as the 
people of central Illinois or eastern Iowa. 

Folic. — The next county north contains 2,480,000 
acres, unsurpassed for fertility, well watered by the 
Eed, the Wild Eice, Marsh, Sand Hill, and Eed 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 203 

Lake Eivers. The county is half as large as Mas- 
sachusetts, and is as capable of sustaining a dense 
population as the kingdom of Belgium or the 
valley of the Ganges. The southern half will be 
accommodated by the Northern Pacific Eailroad. 
Salt springs abound on the Wild Eice Eiver, and 
the State has reserved 23,000 acres of the saline 
territory. 

Pcmhina. — The northwestern county of the State 
contains 2,263,000 acres, all held by government. 

Becker. — This county lies north of Otter-Tail. 
We passed through it on our way from the Eed 
Eiver to the head-waters of the Buffalo. (Descrip- 
tion, p. 113.) It is a region surpassingly beautiful. 
The jNTorthern Pacific Eailroad will pass through 
it, and there you may find 435,000 acres of roll- 
ing prairie and timbered hills. Probably there 
are not fifty settlers in the county. A large por- 
tion of these northwestern counties are unsur- 
veyed, but that will not debar you from pre-empt- 
ing a homestead. 

"How about the southwestern section of the 
State ? " asked my visitor. 

I cannot speak from personal observation be- 
yond Blue Earth County, where the Minnesota 
Eiver crooks its elbow and turns northeast ; but 
from what I have learned I have reason to believe 
that the lands there are just as fertile as those 
already settled nearer the Mississippi, and they 



204 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

will be made available by the railroad now iinder 
construction from St. Paul to Sioux City. 

" Can a man with five hundred dollars make a 
beginning out there with a reasonable prospect of 
success ? " 

Yes, provided he has good pluck, and is willing 
to work hard and to wait. If he can command 
one thousand dollars, he can do a great deal better 
than he can with half that sum. 

If you were to go out sixty miles beyond St. 
Paul to D.arsel, on the St. Paul and Pacific Eailroad 
you would see a farm worked by seven sisters. 
The oldest girl is about twenty-five, the youngest 
fifteen. They lived in Ohio, but their father and 
mother were invalids, and for their benefit came to 
Minnesota in April, 1867, and secured a hundred 
and sixty acres of land under the Homestead Law. 
The neighbors turned out and helped them build a 
log-house, and the girls went to work on the farm. 
Last year (1869) they had forty acres under culti- 
vation, and sold 900 bushels of potatoes, 500 bush- 
els of corn, 200 of wheat, 250 of turnips, 200 of 
beets, besides 1,100 cabbage-heads, and about two 
hundred dollars' worth of other garden products. 
They hired men to split rails for fencing, and also 
to plough the land; but all the other work has 
been done by the girls, who are hale and hearty, 
and find time to read the weekly papers and maga- 
zines. The mother of these girls made the follow- 



A FAMILIAR TALK. 205 

ing remark to a gentleman who visited the farm : 
"The girls are not fond of the hard work they 
have had to do to get the farm started, but they 
are not ashamed of it. We were too poor to keep 
together, and live in a town. We could not make 
a living there, but here we have become comfort- 
able and independent. We tried to give the girls 
a good education, and they all read and write, and 
find a little spare time to read books and papers." 

These plucky girls have set a good example to 
young men who want to get on in the world. 

Perhaps I am too enthusiastic over the future 
prospects of the region between Lake Superior and 
the Pacific, but having travelled through Kansas, 
Nebraska, Utah, and N"evada, I have had an 
opportunity to contrast the capabilities of the two 
sections. Kansas has magnificent prairies, and so 
has Nebraska, but there are no sparkling ponds, no 
wood-fringed lakes, no gurgling brooks abounding 
with trout. The great want of those States is 
water. The soil is exceedingly fertile, even in 
Utah and Nevada, though white with powdered 
alkali, but they are valueless for want of moisture. 
In marked contrast to all this is the great domain 
of the Northwest. For a few years the tide of 
emigration will flow, as it is flowing now, into the 
central States ; but when the lands there along the 
rivers and streams are all taken up, the great river 
of human life, setting towards the Pacific, \vill be 



206 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

turned up the Missouri, the Assinniboine, and the 
Saskatchawan. The climate, the resources of the 
country, the capabilities for a varied industry, and 
the configuration of the continent, alike indicate it. 

I am not sure that Mr. Blotter accepted all this, 
but he has gone to Minnesota with his wife, turn- 
ing his back on a dry-goods counting-house to 
obtain a home on the prairies. 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 207 



CHAPTER XI. 

NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 

THE statesman, tlie political economist, or any 
man who wishes to cast the horoscope of 
the future of this country, must take into con- 
sideration the great lakes, and their connection 
with the Mississippi, the Missouri, and the Colum- 
bia Eivers, and those portions of the continent 
drained by these water-ways. 

Communities do not grow by chance, but by 
the operation of physical laws. Position, climate, 
mountains, valleys, rivers, lakes, arable lands, coal, 
wood, iron, silver, and gold are predestinating 
forces in a nation's history, decreeing occupation, 
character, power, and influence. 

Lakes and navigable streams are natural high- 
ways for trade and traffic ; valleys are natural 
avenues; mountains are toll-gates set up by na- 
ture. He who passes over them must pay down 
in sweat and labor. 

Humboldt discussed the question a third of a 
century ago. " The natural highways of nations," 
said he, " will usually be along the great water- 
courses." 

It impressed me deeply, as long ago as 1846, 



208 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

when the present enormous railway system of the 
continent had hardly begun to be developed. 
Spreading out a map of the Western Hemisphere, I 
then saw that from Cape Horn to Behring's Strait 
there was only one river-system that could be 
made available to commerce on the Pacific coast. 
In South America there is not a stream as large as 
the Merrimac flowing into the Pacific. The waves 
of the ocean break everywhere against the rocky 
wall of the Andes. 

In IS'orth America the Colorado rises on the 
pinnacle of the continent, but it flows through a 
country upheaved by volcanic fires during the 
primeval years. Its chasms and canons are the 
most stupendous on the globe. The course of the 
stream is southwest to the Gulf of California, out 
of the line of direction for commerce. 

The only other great stream of the Pacific coast 
is the Columbia, whose head-waters are in a line 
with those of the Missouri, the Mississippi, the 
Eed Eiver of the ISTorth, and Lake Superior. 

This one feature of the physical geography of 
the continent was sufficient to show me that the 
most feasible route for a great continental high- 
way between the Atlantic and the Pacific must 
be from Lake Superior to the valley of the Co- 
lumbia. 

In cliildhood I had read the travels of Lewis and 
Clark over and over aerain, till I could almost re- 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 209 

peat the entire volume, and, remembering tlieir 
glowing accounts of the country, — the fertility of 
the valley of the Yellowstone, the easy passage 
from the Jefferson fork of the Missouri to the 
Columbia, and the mildness of the winters on the 
Western slope, the conviction was deepened that 
the best route for a railway from the lakes to the 
Pacific w^ould be through one of the passes of the 
Eocky Mountains at the head-waters of the Mis- 
souri. 

Doubtless, many others observant of the physi- 
cal geography of the continent had arrived at the 
same natural conclusion. Seven years later tlie 
government surveys were made along several of 
the • parallels, that from Lake Superior to the Co- 
lumbia being under the direction of Governor I. I. 
Stevens. Jeff Davis was then Secretary of War, 
and his report set forth the northern route as 
being virtually impracticable. It was, according 
to his representation, incapable of sustaining popu- 
lation. A careful study of Governor Stevens's 
Eeport, and a comparison with the re]Oorts along 
the more southern lines, showed that the Secretary 
of War had deliberately falsified the statements 
of Governor Stevens and his assistants. While 
the surveys were being made, Mr. Edwin E. John- 
son, of Middletown, Conn., the present chief engi- 
neer of the Eacific Eailroad, published a pamphlet 
which set forth in a clear and forcible manner 

N 



210 THE SEAT OF EMPIEE. 

the natural advantages of the route by the Mis- 
souri. 

In 1856 the British government sent out an 
exploring expedition under Captain Palliser, whose 
report upon the attractions of British America, 
the richness of the soil, the ease with which a 
road could be constructed to the Pacific through 
British territory, created great interest in Parlia- 
ment. 

" The accomplishment of such a scheme," said 
Mr. Eoebuck, "would unite England with Van- 
couver Island and with China, and they would be 
enabled widely to extend the civilization of Eng- 
land, and he would boldly assert that the civiliza- 
tion of England was greater than that of America." 

" Already," said the Colonial Secretary, Lord 
Lytton, better known to American readers as Bul- 
wer, " in the large territory which extends west of 
the Eocky Mountains, from the American frontier 
and up to the skirts of the Eussian dominions, 
we are laying the foundations of what may become 
hereafter a magnificent abode of the human race." 

There was a tone about these speeches that 
stirred my blood, and I prepared a pamphlet for 
circulation entitled "The Great Commercial Prize," 
which was published in 1858. It was a plea for 
the immediate construction of a railway up the 
valley of the Missouri, and down the Columbia to 
Puget Sound, over the natural highway, giving 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 211 

facts and figures in regard to its feasibility ; but I 
was laughed at for my pains, and set down as a 
visionary by the press. 

It is gratifying to have our good dreams come 
to pass. That which was a dream of mine in 1846 
is in process of fulfilment in 1870. The discovery 
of gold in California and the building up of a 
great city demanded the construction of a railroad 
to San Francisco, which was chartered in 1862, and 
which has been constructed with unparalleled ra- 
pidity, and is of incalculable service to the nation. 

The charter of the Northern Pacific was granted 
in 1864, and approved by President Lincoln on the 
2d of July of that year. Government granted 
no subsidy of bonds, but gave ten alternate sec- 
tions per mile 'on each side of the road in the 
States and twenty on each side of the line in the 
Territories through which it might pass. 

Though the franchise was accompanied by this 
liberal land-grant, it has been found impossible to 
undertake a work of such magnitude till the pres- 
ent time. Nearly every individual named as cor- 
porators in the charter, with the exception of Gov- 
ernor J. G. Smith, its present President, Judge 
E. D. Rice, the Vice-President, and a few others, 
abandoned it under the many difficulties and dis- 
couragements that beset the enterprise. The few 
gentlemen who held on studied the geography of 
the country, and their faith in the future of the 



212 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

l^ortliwest was strengthened. A year ago tliey were 
fortunate enough to find other men as enthusiastic 
as themselves over the resources and capabilities of 
the region between Lake Superior and the Pacific, 
— Messrs. Jay Cooke & Co., the well-known bank- 
ers of Philadelphia, whose names are indissolubly 
connected with the history of the country as its 
successful financial agents at a time when the 
needs of the nation were greatest ; Messrs. Edgar 
Thompson and Thomas A. Scott, of the Pennsyl- 
vania Central Eailroad ; Mr. G. W. Cass, of the 
Pittsburg and Fort Wayne ; Mr. B. P. Cheney, of 
Wells, Fargo, & Co. ; Mr. William B. Ogden, of the 
Chicago "^nd ISTorthwestern Eoad ; Mr. Stinson, of 
Chicago; and other gentlemen, most of ^ whom are 
practical railroad men of large experience and far- 
reaching views. 

Mr. Cooke became the financial agent of the 
company, and from that hour the advancement of 
the enterprise may be dated. Tt required but a 
few days to raise a subscription of $ 5,600,000 
among the capitalists of the country to insure the 
building of the road from Lake Superior to the Eed 
Eiver, to which place it is now under construction. 
The year 1871 will probably see it constructed to 
the Missouri Eiver, thus opening easy communi- 
cation with Montana. The gentlemen who have 
taken hold of the work contemplate its completion 
to the Pacific in three years. 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 213 

The line laid down upon the accompanying map 
only indicates the general direction of the road. 
It is the intention of the company to find the best 
route across the continent, — direct in course, with 
easy grades, — and this can only be ascertained 
by a thorough exploration of the valley of the 
Yellowstone, the passes at the head-waters of the 
Missouri, the valley of the Columbia, and the 
shores and harbors of Puget Sound. 

The engineers are setting their stakes from Lake 
Superior to the Eed Elver, and laborers with spade 
and shovel are following them. Imagination 
bounds onward over the prairies, across the moun- 
tains, down the valley of the Columbia, "and be- 
holds the last rail laid, the last spike driven, and 
a new highway completed across the continent. 

I think of myself as being upon the locomotive, 
for a run from the lakes to the western ocean. 

Our starting-point on the lake is 600 feet above 
the sea. "We gain the height of land between the 
lake and the Mississippi by a gentle ascent. Thir- 
ty-one miles out from Duluth we find the waters 
trickling westward to the Mississippi. There we 
are 558 feet above Lake Superior. It is almost 
a dead level, as the engineers say, from that point 
to the Mississippi, which is 552 feet above the 
lake at Crow Wing, or 1,152 feet above tide-water. 
The distance between the lake and Crow Wing is 
about a hundred miles, and the country is so level 



214 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

that it would be an easy matter to dig a canal and 
turn the Mississippi above Crow Wing eastward 
into the waters that reach the sea through the St. 
Lawrence. 

The Leaf Hills are 267 feet higher than the 
Mississippi, and the ascent is only seven feet to 
the mile, — so slight that the engineers on the 
locomotive reckon it as level grade. These hills 
form the divide between the Mississippi and the 
Eed Eiver. Straight on, over the level valley of 
the Eed Eiver, westward to the summit of the 
rolling prairies between the Eed Eiver and the 
Missouri, the locomotive speeds its way. Gradu- 
ally we rise till we are 2,400 feet above tide- 
water, — the same elevation that is reached on 
the Union Pacific 250 miles west of Omaha. 

A descent of 400 feet carries us to the Missouri. 
We wind up its fertile valley to the richer bot- 
tom-lands of the Yellowstone, over a route so level 
that at the mouth of the Big Horn we are only 
2,500 feet above tide-water. The YelloAvstone 
flows with a swifter current above the Big Horn. 
We are approaching the mountains, and must pass 
the ridge of land that separates the Yellowstone 
from the upper waters of the Missomi. It lies 
950 miles west of Lake Superior, and the summit 
is 4,500 feet above the sea. Through the entire 
distance, thus far, there have been no grades great- 
er than those of the Illinois Central and other 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 215 

prairie railroads of the West, Crossing the Mis- 
souri we are at the back-bone of the continent, 
depressed here like the vertebra of a hollow- 
backed horse. We may glide through the Deer 
Lodge Pass by a grade of fifty feet, at an altitude 
of only 5,000 feet above tide-water. 

Mr. Milnor Eoberts, civil engineer, approached 
it from the west, and this is his description of 
the Pass : — 

" Considered as a railroad route, this valley is re- 
markably favorable, the rise from Deer Lodge City 
to the pass or divide between the waters of the 
Pacific and Atlantic being quite gentle, and even 
on the last few miles, the summit, about 5,000 
feet above the sea, may be attained without em- 
ploying a gradient exceeding fifty feet to the mile, 
wdth a moderate cut. The whole forty miles from 
Deer Lodge City to the summit of the Piocky 
Mountains by this route can be built as cheaply as 
roads are built through prairie countries generally. 
A little more work will be required in passing to 
the east side from this side, down Divide Creek to 
Wisdom or Big Hole Eiver ; but the line will be 
highly favorable on an average all the way to the 
Jefferson Pork of the Missouri Eiver. This favor- 
able pass comes into connection more particularly 
with the Yellowstone Yalley route to the main 
Missouri Yalley. A remarkable circumstance con- 
nected with this pass will convey a very clear view 



216 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE, 

of its peculiarly favorable cliaracter. Private par- 
ties engaged in gold mining, in the gold-fields which 
exist abundantly on both sides of the Eocky 
Mountains, have dug a ditch across this summit 
which is only eighteen feet deep at the apex of the 
divide, through which they carry the waters of 
' Divide Creek,' a tributary of the Missouri, across 
to the Pacific side, where it is used in gold- 
washing, and the waste ^^'ater passes into the 
Pacific Ocean. This has been justly termed high- 
way robbery." 

There are half a dozen passes nearly as low, — 
Mullan's, Blackfoot, Lewis and Clark's, Cadotte's, 
and the Marias. 

Going through the Deer Lodge Pass, we find 
that the stream changes its name very often be- 
fore reaching the Pacific. The little brook on the 
summit of the divide, turbid with the washings of 
the gold-mines, is called the Deer Lodge Creek. 
Twenty-five miles farther on it is joined by a 
small stream that trickles from the summit of 
Mullan's Pass, near Helena, and the two form the 
Hell Gate, just as the Pemigewasset and Winni- 
pesaukee form the INIerrimac in Xew Hampshire, 
receiving its name from the many Indian fights 
that have taken place in its valley, where the 
Blackfeet and Nez Perces have liad many a battle. 
The stream bears the name of Hell Gate for about 
eighty miles before being joined by the Blackfoot, 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 217 

which flows from the mountains in the vicinity of 
Caclotte's and Lewis and Clark's Passes. 

A little below the junction it empties into the 
Bitter Eoot, which, after a winding course of a 
hundred miles, is joined by the Flathead, that 
comes down from Flathead Lake and the country 
around Marias Pass. The united streams below 
the junction take the name of Clark's Elver, which 
has a circuitous course northward, running for a 
little distance into British America, then back 
again through a wide plain till joined by the 
Snake, and the two become the Columbia, pouring 
a mighty flood westward to the ocean. The line 
of the road does not follow the river to the boun- 
dary between the United States and the British 
Possessions, but strikes across the plain of the 
Columbia. 

The characteristics of Clark's Eiver and the 
surrounding country are thus described by Mr. 
Eoberts : — 

" Clark's Eiver has a flow in low water at least 
six times greater than the low-water flow of the 
Ohio Eiver between Pittsburg and Wheeling ; and 
while its fall is slight, considered with reference 
to railroad grades, it is so considerable as to afford 
a great number of water-powers, whose future 
value must be very great, — an average of eleven 
feet per mile. 

" Around Lake Pend d' Oreille, and for some miles 

10 



218 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

westward, and all along Clark's Eiver above the 
lake as far as we traversed it, there is a mag- 
nificent region of pine, cypress, hemlock, tama- 
rack, and cedar timber, many of the trees of prodi- 
gious size. I measured one which was thirty-four 
feet in circumference, and a number that were 
over twenty-seven feet, and saw hundreds, as we 
passed along, that were from twenty to twenty-five 
feet in circumference, and from two hundred to 
two hundred and fifty feet high. A number of 
valleys containing large bodies of this character of 
timber enter Clark's Eiver from both sides, and 
the soil of these valleys is very rich. Clark's 
Eiver Valley itself is for much of the distance 
confined by very high hills approaching near to 
the stream in many places ; but there are suffi- 
cient sites for cities and farms adjacent to water- 
powers of the first class, and not many years can 
elapse after the opening of a railroad through this 
valley till it will exhibit a combination of in- 
dustries and population analogous to those which 
now mark the Lehigh, the Schuylkill, the Sus- 
quehanna, and the Pomroy region of the Ohio 
Eiver. Passing along its quiet scenes of to- 
day, we can see in the near future the vast 
change which the enterprise of man will bring. 
That which was once the work of half a century 
is now the product of three or four years. Indeed, 
in a single year after the route of this Northern 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 219 

Pacific Railroad shall have been determined, and 
the work fairly begun, all this region, now so calm 
and undisturbed, will be teeming with life instilled 
into it by hardy pioneers from the Atlantic and 
from the Pacific. 

"Passinsj alono' the Flathead River for a short 
distance, we entered the valley of the Jocko River. 
The same general remarks concerning Clark's 
River Valley are applicable to the Flathead and 
Bitter Root Valleys. The climate, the valleys, the 
timber, the soil, the water-powers, all are here, 
awaiting only the presence of the industrious 
white man to render to mankind the benefits im- 
planted in them by a beneficent Creator." 

The entire distance from Lake Superior by the 
Yellowstone Valley to the tide-waters of the 
Pacific below the cascades of the Columbia will 
be about eighteen hundred miles. It is nearly 
the same distance to Seattle, on Puget Sound, by 
the Snoqualmie Pass of the Cascade Range. 

The Union Pacific line has had no serious ob- 
struction from snow since its completion. It has 
suffered no more than other roads of the country, 
and its trains have arrived as regularly at Omaha 
and Sacramento as the trains of the New York 
Central at Buffalo or AllDany. That the N'orthern 
Pacific road will be quite as free from snow-block- 
ades will be manifest by a perusal of the following 
paragraphs from the report of Mr. Roberts : — 



220 THE SEAT OF EMPIKE. 

" There is evidence enoiigli to sliow that the line 
of road on the general route herein described will, 
in ordinary winters, be much less encumbered with 
snow where it crosses the mountains than are the 
passes at more southerly points, which are much 
more elevated above the sea. The difference of 
five or six degrees of latitude is more than com- 
pensated by the reduced elevation above the sea- 
level, and the climatic effect of the warm ocean- 
currents from the equator, already referred to, 
ameliorating the seasons from the Pacific to the 
Eocky Mountains. An examination of the jjrofile 
of the Union Pacific and Central Pacific lines 
betAveen Omaha, on the Missouri Eiver, and Sacra- 
mento, California, a distance of 1,775 miles, shows 
that there are four main summits, — Sherman 
Summit, on the Black Hills, about 550 miles 
from Omaha, 8,235 feet above the sea ; one on the 
Eocky Mountains, at Aspen Summit, about 935 
miles from Omaha, 7,463 feet ; one at Humboldt 
Mountain, about 1,245 miles from Omaha, 6,076 
feet; and another on the Sierra ISTevada, only 
105 miles from the western terminus at Sacra- 
mento, 7,062 feet ; whilst from a point west of 
Cheyenne, 520 miles from Omaha, to Wasatch, 
970 miles from Omaha, a continuous length of 
450 miles, every portion of the graded road is 
more than 6,000 feet above the sea, being about 
1,000 feet on this long distance higher than the 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 221 

highest summit grade on the ISTorthern Pacific 
Eailroad route ; whilst for the corresponding dis- 
tance on the ISTorthern Pacific line the average 
elevation is under 3,000 feet, or three thousand 
feet lower than the Sherman Summit on the Pa- 
cific line. 

"On the Union Pacific road the profile also 
shows that for 900 continuous miles, from Sidney 
westward, the road has an average height of over 
5,000 feet, and the lowest spot on that distance 
is more than 4,000 feet above the sea, whereas on 
the Northern route only about sixty miles at most 
are as high as 4,000 feet, and the corresponding 
distance of 900 miles, extending from the mouth 
of the Yellowstone to the valley of Clark's Eiver, 
is, on an average, about 3,000 feet lower than 
the Union Pacific line. Allowing that 1,000 feet 
of elevation causes a decrease of temperature of 
three degrees, this would be a difference of nine 
degrees. There is, therefore, a substantial reason 
for the circumstance, now well authenticated, that 
the snows on the Northern route are much less 
troublesome than they are on the Union Pacific 
and Central Pacific routes " (Report, p. 43). 

That the Northern Pacific can be economically 
worked is demonstrated by a comparison of its 
grades with those of the line already constructed. 
The comparison is thus presented by Mr. Rob- 
erts : — 



222 THE SEAT OF EMPIEE. 

"The grades on tlie route across through the 
State of Minnesota and Territory of Dakota to 
the Missouri Eiver will not be materially dissimilar 
to those on the other finished railroads south of it, 
passing from Chicago to Sioux City, Council Bluffs, 
etc. ; namely, undulating within the general limit 
of about forty feet per mile, although it may be 
deemed advisable, at a few points for short distan- 
ces, to run to a maximum of one foot per hundred 
or fifty-three feet per mile. There is sufficient 
knowledge of this portion of the route to w^arrant 
this assumption. And beyond the Missouri, along 
the valley of the Yellowstone, to near the Bozeman 
Pass, there is no known reason for assuming any 
higher limits. In passing Bozeman Summit of 
the Belt Eange, and in going up the eastern side 
of the Eocky Mountains, it may be found advisable 
to adopt a somewhat higher gradient for a few 
miles in overcoming those summits. This, how- 
ever, can only be finally determined after careful 
surveys. 

The highest ground encountered between Lake 
Superior and the Missouri Eiver, at the mouth of 
the Yellowstone, is only 2,300 feet above the sea ; 
the low summit of the Eocky Mountains is but 
little over 5,000 feet, and the Bozeman Pass, 
through the Belt Eange, is assumed to be about 500 
feet lower. The height of the country upon wdiich 
the line is traced, and upon which my estimate of 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 223 

cost is based, may be approximately stated thus, 
beginning at Lake Superior, going westward : — 





Miles. 


Average neign 
above the sea. 


To Dakota Valley, . 


. 300 . 


. 1,200 feet 


Yellowstone River, 


300 . 


2,200 " 


Along Yellowstone, . 


. 400 . 


. 2,500 " 


Flathead Valley, . 


300 . 


3,500 " 


Lewis or Snake River, 


. 200 . 


. 3,000 " 


Puget Sound, 


500 . 


400 " 



2,000 
Compare this with the profiles of the finished 
line of the Union and Central Pacific roads. Prop- 
erly, the comparison should be made from Chicago, 
the eastern water terminus of Lake Michigan, of 
the Omaha line. There are, on that route, approxi- 
mately, as follows : — 





Miles. 


From Chicago to Omaha, 


. 500 


Near Cheyenne, 


500 


Cooper's, . 


. 100 


Promontory Point, . 


485 


Humboldt, 


. 406 


Reno, .... 


130 


Auburn, 


. 118 


Sacramento, . 


36 


San Francisco, . 


. 100 


Chicago to San Francisco 


2,375 



Average height 
above the sea. 


1,000 feet 


3,300 




7,300 




6,200 




4,750 




4,000 




4,400 




300 




50 





" On the ISTorthern Pacific line there need be but 
two principal summits, whilst on the other there 
are four, the lowest of which is about a thousand 



224 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

feet higher than the highest on the northern route. 
If, therefore, the roads were the same length be- 
tween the Pacific waters and the great lakes and 
navigable rivers east of the Eocky Mountains, the 
advantage would be largely in favor of the North- 
ern route : but this actual distance is three hundred 
and seventy-five miles less, and the equated dis- 
tance for ascents and descents in its favor will be 
very considerable " (Eeport, p. 45). 

From the explorations and surveys already made 
by the engineers, it is believed that there need be 
no gradient exceeding sixty feet per mile between 
Lake Superior and the Pacific Ocean. If such be 
the fact, it wiU enable the company to transport 
freight much more cheaply than the central line 
can carry it, where the grades are one hundred and 
sixteen feet to the mile, over the Sierra Nevada 
Eange. To those who never have had time to ex- 
amine the subject, the following tabular statement 
in regard to the power of a thirty-ton engine on 
different grades will be interesting. An engine 
weighing thirty tons will draw loaded cars on dif- 
ferent grades as follows : — 

On a level 94 cars 

10 feet per mile ascending . . 56 " 



20 
30 
40 
50 
60 



40 " 
30^" 
25 " 
20i" 
17 " 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 225 



70 


fee 


b per 


mile ascending 


. 15 cars. 


80 






a a 


13 '' 


90 






U (I 


. iir^ 


100 






a u 


10 " 


110 






iC i( 


. 8^" 


120 






li 11 


6 " 



A full car-load is reckoned at seven tons. It 
has been found in the operation of railroads that 
an engine which will move one hundred and sev- 
enteen tons on a grade sixty feet per mile will 
move only about fifty tons on a grade of one hun- 
dred and sixteen feet. A second glance at the 
diagram (p. 48) shows us that the sum of ascents 
and descents on the line already constructed must 
be vastly greater than that now under construc- 
tion ; and inasmuch as it is impossible to carry a 
load up or down hill without costing something, 
it follows that this road can be operated more 
economically than a line crossing four mountain- 
ranges, and the ultimate result will be a cheapen- 
ing of transportation across the continent, and a 
great development of the Asiatic trade. 

Throughout the entire distance between Lake 
Superior and the Pacific Ocean along the line, the 
husbandman may turn the sod with his plough, 
the herdsman fatten his flocks, the lumberman reap 
the harvest of the forests, or the miner gather 
golden ore. 

A Bureau of Emigration is to be established by 

10* o 



226 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

the company, which will be of invaluable service 
to the emigrant. 

Many persons in the Eastern and Middle States 
are desirous of moving to the Northwest, but it is 
hard to cut loose from old associations, to leave 
home and friends and strike out alone upon the 
prairie ; they want company. The human race is 
gregarious. There are not many who care to be 
hermits, and most of us prefer society to solitude. 

This feature of human nature is to be kept in 
view, and it will be the aim of the Bureau of Emi- 
gTation to offer every facility to those seeking new 
homes to take their friends with them. 

Upon the completion of every twenty-five miles 
of road, the company will be put in possession of 
forty sections of land per mile. The government 
will hold the even-numbered sections, and the 
company those bearing the odd numbers. 

The land will be surveyed, plotted, and the dis- 
tinctive features of each section described. Emi- 
gration offices are to be established in our own 
country as well as abroad, where maps, plans, and 
specifications will be found. 

One great drawback to the settlement of the 
prairie lands of Illinois and Iowa has been the 
want of timber for the construction of houses. 
Persons with limited means, having only their own 
hands, found it hard to get started on a treeless 
prairie. Their first work is to obtain a house. The 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 227 

Bureau propose to help the man who is anxious to 
help himself on in the world, by putting up a port- 
able house for him on the land that he may select. 
The houses will be small, but they will serve till 
the settler can get his farm fenced in, his ground 
ploughed, and two or three crops of wheat to mar- 
ket. The abundance of timber in Minnesota will 
enable the company to carry out this new feature 
of emigration. 

It will be an easy matter for a family from 
Lowell, another from Methnen, a third from Ando- 
ver, a fourth from Heading, a fifth from Haverhill, 
to select their land m a body and start a Massa- 
chusetts colony in the Seat of Empire. 

Far better this method than for each family to 
go out by itself. Going as a colony they will car- 
ry the moral atmosphere of their old homes with 
them. They will have a school in operation the 
week after their arrival. And on Sabbath morn- 
ing, swelling upward on the summer air, sweeter 
than the lay of lark amid the flowers, will ascend 
the songs of the Sunday school established in 
their new home. Looking forward with ardent 
hope to prosperous years, they will still look be- 
yond the earthly to the heavenly, and sing, — 

'* My heavenly home is bright and fair, 
Nor pain nor death shall enter there." 

This is no fancy sketch ; it is but a description 
of what has been done over and over again in 



228 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and all the Western 
States. The Northern Pacific Eailroad Company 
want their lands settled by an industrious, thrifty, 
energetic peo]3le, who prize everything that goes 
to make up the highest grade of civilization, and 
they are ready to render such help as no colonies 
have yet had. 

The land will be sold to actual settlers at low 
rates, and on liberal terms of payment. The 
portable houses will be sold at cost, transported 
on the cars, and set up for the colonists if they 
desire it. 

The Bureau will be put in operation as soon as 
it can be systematically organized, and I doubt not 
that thousands will avail themselves of its advan- 
tages to establish their future homes near a rail- 
road which will give the shortest line across the 
continent, marked by low gradients, running 
through the lowest passes of the Eocky Moun- 
tains, through a country capable of cultivation all 
the way from the lakes to the Pacific. 

Am I dreaming ? 

Across this belt of land between Lake Superior 
and the Pacific lies the world's great future high- 
way. The physical features of this portion of the 
continent are favorable for the development of 
every element of a high civilization. 

Take one more look at the map, and observe the 
situation of the St. Lawrence and the lakes, fur- 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 229 

nishing water-carriage for freight half-way from 
ocean to ocean, — the prairies extending to the 
base of the Eocky Mountains, — the one summit 
to be crossed, — the bays, inlets, and harbors of 
the Pacific shore laved by ocean currents and 
warmed by winds wafted from the equator to the 
Arctic Sea. Observe also the shortest lines of 
latitude. 

The geographical position is in the main axial 
line of the world's grand commercial movement. 
San Francisco and Puget Sound are the two west- 
ern gateways of the continent. Eapid as has 
been the advancement of civilization around the 
Golden Gate, magnificent as its future may be, yet 
equally grand and majestic will be the northern 
portal of the great Eepublic. Not only will it be 
on the shortest possible route between England 
and Asia, but it will be in the direct line between 
England and the Asiatic dominions of Eussia. 

"While we are building our railroads westward 
from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the Emperor of 
Eussia is extending his from the Ural Llountains 
eastward, down the valley of the Amoor, to 
open communication with China and Japan. The 
shortest route of travel round the world a few 
years hence will lie through the northern section 
of this continent and through Siberia. The 
Himalaya Eange of mountains and the deserts of 
Central Asia will be impassible barriers to rail- 



230 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

roads between India and China, or Central Europe 
and tlie East ; but the valley of the Amoor is fer- 
tile, and there is no fairer section of the Czar's do- 
minions than Siberia. From Puget Sound straight 
across the Pacific will be found, a few years hence, 
the shortest route around the world. 

Farm-houses dot the landscape, roses climb by 
cottage-doors, bees fill the air with their humming, 
bringing home to their hives the sweets gathered 
from far-off prairie-flowers ; the prattle of children's 
voices floats upon the air, the verdant waste be- 
comes an Eden, villages, towns, and cities spring 
into existence. A great metropolis rises upon the 
Pacific shore, where the winter air is laden with 
the perfume of ever-blooming flowers. 

The ships of all nations lie at anchor in the 
land-locked bays, or shake out their sails for a 
voyage to the Orient. Steamships come and go, 
laden with the teas of China and Japan, the cof- 
fee of Java, the sj^ices of Sumatra. I hear the 
humming of saws, the pounding of hammers, the 
flying of shuttles, the click and clatter of ma- 
chinery. By every mill-stream springs up a town. 
The slopes are golden with ripening grain. The 
forest, the field, the mine, the river, alike yield 
their abundance to the ever-growing multitude. 

Such is the outlook towards the future. Will 
the intellectual and moral dcA^elopment keep pace 
with the physical growth ? If those are wanting, 



NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 231 

the advancement will be towards Sodom. The fu- 
ture man of the Northwest will have American, 
Norse, Celtic, and Saxon blood in his veins. His 
countenance, in the pure, dry, electric air, will be 
as fresh as the morning. His muscles will be iron, 
his nerves steel. Vigor will characterize his every 
action, — for climate gives quality to the blood, 
strength to the muscles, power to the brain. In- 
dolence is characteristic of people living in the 
tropics, and energy of those in temperate zones. 

The citizen of the ISTortliwest will be a freeman. 
No shackles will bind him, nor will he wear a lock 
upon his lips. To the emigrant from the Old 
World the crossing of the ocean is an act of eman- 
cipation ; it is like the Marseillaise, — it fires him 
with new hopes and aspirations. 

"Here tlie free spirit of mankind at length 

Throws its last fetters off, and who shall place 
A limit to the giant's unchained strength, 

Or curb his swiftness in the forw^ard race ? 

For like the comet's way through infinite space, 
Stretches the long untravelled path of light 

Into the depth of ages ; we may ti-ace, 
Distant, the brightening glory of its flight, 
Till the receding rays are lost to human sight." 

I do not look with desponding eyes into the 
future. The nations everywhere, — in Europe and 
Asia, — the new and the old, are moving onward 
and upward as never before, and America leads 
them. Eailroads, steamships, school-houses, print- 
ing-presses, free platforms and pulpits, an open 



232 THE SEAT OF EMPIRE. 

Bible, are tlie propelling forces of the nineteenth 
century. It remains only for the Christian men 
and women of this country to give the Bible, the 
Sunday and the common school to the coming mil- 
lions, to insure a greatness and grandeur to Amer- 
ica far surpassing anything in human history. 

It win not be for America alone ; for, under the 
energizing powers of this age the entire human 
race is moving on towards a destiny unseen except 
to the eye of faith, but unmistakably grand and 
glorious. 

I have been an observer of the civilization of 
Europe, and have seen the kindlings of new life, 
at the hands of England and the United States, in 
India and China ; and through the drifting haze of 
the future I behold nations rising from the dark- 
ness of ancient barbarism into the light of modern 
civilization, and the radiant cross once reared on 
Calvary throwing its peaceful beams afar, — over 
ocean, valley, lake, river, and mountain, illuming 
all the earth. 

Situated where the great stream of human life 
will pour its mightiest flood from ocean to ocean, 
beneficently endowed with nature's riches, and 
illumed by such a light, there will be no portion 
of all earth's wide domain surpassing in glory and 
grandeur this future Seat of Empire. 



Cambridge : Printed by Welch, Bigelow, and Company. 



GREAT CENTRAL ROUTE 
via Niagara Falls. 



MICHIGAN OENTRAL & GREAT WESTERN 

RA-ILRO^DS. 



Prom Boston and New York to Chicago, connect- 
ing there with all the great Railways, 
North, South, and West. 

r^oTJLir Tr a/ins ID«;ily. 

Pullman's Palace, Hotel, Drawing-Room, and 
Sleeping Cars on Express Trains. 



Freight taken through by the " BI.UE L.INE " 

without breaking bulk, and in as short 
time as by any other line. 



PASSENGER AGENTS. 

p. K. RANDALL, Boston. 

CHARLES E. NOBLE, .... New York. 
HENRY C. WENTWORTH, . . Chicago. 



THE FIRST DIVISION OF THE 

St. Paul and Pacific Railroad Company. 



LAND DEPARTMENT. 

THE COMPANY NOW OFFERS FOR SALE 

1,000,000 ^cres of Land, 

Located along their two Railroad Lines, viz. : From St. Paul, via St. Anthony, 
Anoka, St. Cloud, and Sauk Rapids, to Watab ; and from St. 
Anthony, via Minneapolis, Wayzata, Crow River, 
Waverly, and Forest City, to the West- 
ern Boundary of the State. 



THESE LANDS COMPRISE TIMBER, MEADOW, 

AND PRAIRIE LANDS, 

And are all within easy distance of the Railroad, in the midst of considerable 
Settlements, convenient to Churches and Schools. 



Inducement to Settlers. 

The attention of persons whose limited means fprbid the purchase of a 
homestead in the older States, is particularly invited to these lands. The 
farms are sold in tracts of 40 or 80 acres and upwards, at prices ranging from 
S5.00 to !$ 10.00 per acre. Cash sales are always One Dollar per acre less 
than Credit sales. In the latter case 10 years are granted if required. 

Example. — 80 acres at S 8 00 per acre, on long credit, — S GiO.OO. A part 
payment on the principal is always desired, but in case the means of the set- 
tler are very limited, the Company allows him to pay only One Year's Interest 
down, dividing the principal in ten equal annual payments, with seven per 
cent interest each year on the unpaid balance : 





Int. Prin. 




Int. Prin. 


Ist payment . 


. . $44.80 


7th payment . 


. . $ 17.92 $ 64 


2d " 


. . 40.32 $64 


8th " . . 


. . 13.44 64 


3d " 


. . 35.84 64 


9th " 


. . 8.96 64 


4th " . . 


. . 31.36 64 


lOth " . . 


. . 4.48 64 


5th " 


. . 26.28 64 


11th " 


. . 64 


6th " . . 


. . 22.40 64 







The purchaser has the privilege to pay up any time within the 10 years, 
thereby saving the payment of interest. 

The same land may be purchased for .$ 560.00 cash. Any other information 
will be furnished on application in person, or by letter, in English, French or 
German, addressed to 

LAND COMMISSIONER, 
First Division St. Paxil & Pacific R. R. Co., 
SAINT PAUL, MINN. 



LAKE SHORE AND MICHIGAN 
Southern Railway. 



THE GREAT SOUTH SHORE LINE BETWEEN 

BUFFAIiO AI¥D CHICAGO 



All trains on the New York Central Hudson River Railroad, and all trains 
on the Erie Railway, form sure and reliable connections at Buffalo with the 

GREAT LAKE SHORE LINE. 

All the great railways in the Northwest and Southwest connect at Chicago, 
Toledo, or Cleveland with this Line. 

Palace, Drawing-Room, Sleeping Coaches daily between New York and 
Chicago, through without change. 



FAST FREIGHT LINES. 

The following lines transport freight between Boston, New York, and prin- 
cipal points in New England to Cleveland, Toledo, Chicago, and principal 
points in the Southwest and Northwest, without break of bulk or transfer. 

RED I.INE, WHITE tlNE, 

SOUTH SHORE MNE, EMPIRE I.INE, 

COMMERCIAI. I.INE FROM BALTIMORE. 



Passengers or shippers of freight will find it to their interest to call on the 
Agents of these Lines. 

F. E. MORSE, CHS. F. HATCH, 

Gcn'Z Western Pass-r ^o-'f, OenH Superintendent, 

Chicago, lU. J. A. BURCH, Cleveland, O. 

Qen'l Eastern Pass''r Jlg^t, 
Buflfalo, N. Y. 



VERMONT CENTRAL 

FL. 'FL. I-iixxe. 



The GREAT Northern Line and most direct route from 

BOSTON and ALL POINTS in New England to 

the CANADAS, DETROIT, CHICAGO, 

AND 

All points West, Northwest, & Southwest. 



NEW SLEEPING-CAES, 

the most elegant from Boston, and SPLENDID DRAWING- 
ROOM CARS run on every express train, connecting 
on the Grand Trunk Railway with 

Pullman's Palace, Hotel, and Sleeping Cars; 

this being the only line affording such comfort and luxury, 
to the passenger between the East and West. 



TIlflE FREIGHT 

VIA 

ISTational Despatch. Line. 

Freight taken for Chicago, St. Louis, and all points West 

Avitliout breaking bulk or transfer, in as short 

time as any other line. 

' |^°* For full information relating to time contracts, Tickets, &c., 

&c., please address or call at 

No. 65 Washington Street (Sears Building), Boston. 
LANSING MILLIS, General Agent. 

(Montreal Office, No. 30 Great St. James St.) 
(New York Office, No. 9 Astor House.) 



Lake Superior & Mississippi Railroad. 



The line of this road is from St. Paul, the head of naTigation on the Mis- 
sissippi River, to the head of Lake Superior, a distance of 140 uwles. It con- 
nects at St. Paul with each of the long lines of railroad traversing the vast 
and fertile regions of Minnesota in all directions, and converging at St. Paul- 
It connects the commerce and business of the Mississippi and Minnesota 
Rivers, the CaUfornia Central Railroad, and the Northern Pacific Railroad, 
with Lake Superior and the commercial system of the great lakes, and makes 
the outlet or commercial track to the lakes, over which must pass the com- 
merce of a region of country second to none on the American continent in 
capacity for production. 

The land grant made by the government of the United States and by the 
State of Minnesota, in aid of the construction of this road, is the largest in 
quantity and most valuable in kind ever made in aid of any railway in either 
of the American States. 

This grant amounts to seventeen square miles or sections [10,880 acres] of 
land for each mile of the road, and in the aggregate to One Million, Six 
Hundred and Tliirty-t^vo Tlioiisand Acres of Land. 

These lands are for the most part well timbered with pine, butternut, white 
oak, sugar maple, and other valuable timber, and are perhaps better adapted 
to the raising of stock, winter wheat, corn, oats, and most kinds of agricul 
tural products, than any equal quantity of land in the Northwest. 

These lands are well watered with running streams and innumerable lakes, 
and within the limits of the land belonging to the Company there is an abun- 
dance of water-power for manufacturing purposes. 

A glance at the map, and an intelligent comprehension of the course of 
trade, and way to the markets of the Eastern cities and to Europe, for the 
products of this section of the Northwest, will at once satisfy any one who 
examines the question that the lands of this Company, by reason of the low- 
freights at "which their products reach market, have a value — independent 
of that which arises from their superior quality — which can hardly be over- 
estimated. 

Twenty cents saved in sending a bushel of wheat to market adds four dol- 
lars to the yearly product of an acre of wheat land, and what is true of this 
will apply to all other articles of farm produce transported to market, and 
demonstrates that the value of lands depends largely on the price at which 
their products can be carried to market. 

THE I.ANDS OF THIS COMPANY ARE 
NOW OFFERED TO 

Imraigraiits and Settlers 

at the most favorable rates, as to time and terms of 
payment. 

W. L. BANNING, 

President and land Commissioner, Saint Paul, Minnesota. 



iC 



CARLETON'S" WORKS. 




OUR NAGPORE COACH. 



OUR mW WAY ROUXD THE WORLD ; 



WHERE TO GO AND WHAT TO SEE. 

By Charles Carleton Coffin. Containing several full-page Maps, 
showing steamship lines and routes of travel, and profusely illus- 
trated with more than 100 engravings, reproduced from photo- 
graphs and original sketches. Crown octavo. Morocco Cloth* 
$3.00 ; Half Calf, $5.50 ; Library Edition, $3.50. 

"In Mr. Charles C. Coffin we have a traveller after the latest and best 
transatlantic pattern. He has thrown himself thoroughly into the spirit of 
his age and race ; jet, while loyal to the backbone, and indorsing to the full 
his country's claims to present grandeur and future pre-eminence, he has a 
corner in his soul for the merits of other lands, and is open to the lessons of 
Old- World wisdom. Rapid as was his flight, and superficial as was his pur- 
view of the multitudinous objects that daily crowded his path, his powers of 
observation are, we are bound to say, keen and vigorous, and his judgments 
upon men and things both shrewd and impartial. Be it the aspects of nature. 



OUR NEW WAY ROUND THE WORLD. 



the historical monuments, the national traits, or the social idiosyncrasies that 
come before him, we find him invariably alive to what is most beautiful or 
august or original or piquant, as the case may be. He is at all times happy 
in hitting ofif the salient features, or picking out the weak spots, in local life 

and manners The history of British rule in India, and the tokens of 

material and social advancement everywhere beside his path, are themes after 
the American's own heart. We have never seen a more graphic or telling ' 
sketch of Anglo-Indian life and characteristics within anything like the com- 
pass of Mr. Coffin's flying experiences Mr. Coffin's studies of life in 

China are eminently piquant and original. Nothing is too old or too new to 

escape his notice The wood-cuts intersi>ersed among his pages deserve 

a word of commendation. They are drawn with vigor and truth, often show- 
ing touches of quaint and quiet humor. Altogether, if there is nothing new 
under the sun. Our New Way Round the World shows there may be much 
novelty and freshness in the mode of telling even a thrice-told tale." — Sat- 
urday Review {London). 

" The author of this interesting and valuable tour of the globe starts from 
New York, visits every city of note in Europe, sails from Marseilles to Alex- 
andria, thence to Cairo, and Suez Canal, India, China, and Japan, returning 
by the way of California. Through this wide field for observation and re- 
search, his keen habits of characterization, and his vivid powers of descrip- 
tion make him an exceedingly agreeable travelling companion. Mr. Coffin 
has the very happy faculty of giving to a really thrice-told tale of travel a 
freshness that carries the reader to the end of the volume with unabated 
interest. His tour in the interior of the British possessions in India is full 
of interest, — and his elaborate pictures of China at the present time are 
valuable, showing the actual character of the people ; the tenacity of their 
prejudices, which appear to resist all innovation from ' outside barbarians,' is 
most graphically depicted, and is worthy the attention of our politicians and 
speculative philanthropists. The book on the whole is a valuable addition to 
our native literature, written as it is from a distinctive American stand-point 
view of foreign nations. Numerous spirited designs, illustrative of habits 
and manners, adorn the work, together with maps in abundance." — JV. Y. 
Express. 

" A model record of travel, over fields comparatively unknown. It com- 
bines, in a remarkable degree, skill and judgment in the selection of facts 
and points, with clearness, accuracy, and proportion in their statement : a 
natural ease and grace of expression, with a genial spirit, and a broad, true 
sympathy with everything human. A very large amount of instructive and 
attractive matter is compressed in its pages. I'he illustrations, too, are nu- 
merous, and all in admirable keeping with the narrative. In these, and in 
the clear, fair, readable type, the publishers have well done their part. 

" We confess to a deeper, and consciously healthier interest in the perusal 
than in the reading of any similar volume. Yery heartily, therefore, do we 
commend the book to the winter-evening family circle, sure that it will in- 
struct and charm alike both young and old." — JV. Y. Christian World. 

" The book has many excellent illustrations, and is written with all the 
loveliness and instructiveness for which ' Carleton ' became famous during 
the war, as a war correspondent of the Boston Journal. The book is gossipy 
and entertaining in a high degree, and will interest young and old." — JVeto 
York Evenina- Post. 



*** Fo?' sale by all booksellers, or sent, post-paid, to any address, by 
the Publishers, 



FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., 

134 Tremont Street, Boston. 




FOUR YEARS OF FIGHTING. 

A volume of Personal Observation with the Army and Navy, from 

the first Battle of Bull Run to the Fall of Richmond. 1 vol. 8vo. 

With Steel Portrait of the Author, and numerous Illustrations. 

Cloth, $3.50; Slieep, $4.50. 

From Senator Yates, of Illinois. 

.... From the accuracy with which you relate those incidents which fell 
under my personal observation, I am persuaded that the whole volume forms 
a very valuable addition to the historic literature of the heroic age of die 
Republic. I am, sir, your obliged friend, RICU'D YATES. 

*^* For sale by all Booksellers. Sent, post-paid, on receipt of price 
by the Publishers, 

FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., Boston. 



^ n/'^ 




MY DAYS AND NIGHTS ON THE 
BATTLE-FIELD. 

A Book for Boys. By " Carleton." 1 vol. 16mo. Illustrated. 

$1.50. 
«f'l? is ^tten by one of the best of the war correspondents, < Carleton ' 
ot the Boston Journal, whose opportunities for observing all the celebrated 
vL; !>/! ^^^ T""^ unsurpassed. The book is really a history of the first 
year ot the war, and describes the principal battles of that period, — Bull 
vi,i°T , :,?r^°^.^' ^'^^^ Douelson, Pittsburg Landing, Columbus, New Mad- 
im, island No. 10, and Memphis, in part of which the writer was, and all of 
which he sa.vr.'' — Buffalo Express. 

*** For sale by all Booksellers. Sent, post-paid, on receipt of price 
by the Publishers, )^ ^ > i j^ 

FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., Boston. 




FOLLOWING THE FLAG. 

From August, 1861, to November, 1862, with the Army of the Poto- 
mac. By " Cakleton." 1vol. 16mo. Ilkistrated. $1.50. 

" « Carleton is by all odds the best writer for boys on the war. His ' Days 
and Nights on the Battle-Field ' made him famous among the young folks. 
To read his books is equal in interest to a bivouac or a battle, and is free from 
the hard couch and harder bread of the one, and the jeopardizing bullets of 
the other. To be entertained and informed, we would rather peruse ' Fol- 
lowing the Flag ' than study a dozen octavo volumes written by a world- 
renowned historian." — Indianapolis Journal. 

*.** For sale by all Booksellers. Sent, post-paid, on receipt of price 
by the Publishers. 

FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., Boston, 



WINNING HIS WAY 

BY "CARLETON." 
1 vol. 16mo. Illustrated. $ 1.25. 



Clement, Clinton Co., Illinois. 
Mr. Carleton. 

Dear Sir, — Is " Winning His Way " a true story ? 
Is the story published in book form ? 
Where does Paul live ? 

I am very much interested in the story, but my father thinks it is all fic- 
tion as he calls it. 

If you -will answer this you will oblige a boy ten years old, who has read it 
four times, and who means to read it again when I go over to Aunt Leach's. 
Paul's ardent admirer, 

JOHN W. SCOTT. 
April 16, 1870. 

Boston, May 7, 1870. 
John W. Scott. 

My Dear Young Friend, — I am very much gratified to hear that you are 
so much interested in "Winning His Way," which has been published in 
book form by Messrs. Fields, Osgood, & Co. 

You askjf it is a true story. I will tell you about it : I knew a brave boy 
who went into the army and fought just as Paul fought, who was left on the 
field for dead, and who was taken to a rebel prison, and I had him in mind all 
the time I was writing the story. 

That is all true about painting the pigs, and shutting the school-house 
door, and tying the hay in front of the old horse's nose. 

So you can tell your father that the things did not happen just in the or- 
der they are given in the book, but that I tried to make the story true to 
life. Your friend, 

CARLETON. 



" A story of a poor Western boy who, with true American grit in his com- 
position, worked his way into a position of honorable independence, and who 
was among the first to rally round the flag when the day of his country's peril 
came. There is a sound, manly tone about the book, a freedom from nam- 
by-pambyism, worthy of all commendation." — Sunday School Times. 

" One of the best of stories for boys." — Hartford Courant. 



*** Fo7' sale hy all Booksellers. Se7it, post-paid, on receipt of price 
by the Publishers, 

FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO., Boston. 



